Before I wrote Flat 401, I worked for over a decade as a clinical psychologist. I spent years learning to understand the human mind and people’s experiences, and training to be able to help people overcome emotional challenges. At the time, I didn’t think of it as ‘preparation for novel-writing,’ but it turned out to come in handy!
Below are five ways my clinical background has informed how I write; I hope you might use these ideas too.
1. Tension: threat, not just action
In Compassion-Focused Therapy, we talk about the threat system - the part of the brain that activates when something feels dangerous. Importantly, it doesn’t distinguish between actual threat and perceived threat. The same group of physiological responses can be triggered by a near car crash or by a passive-aggressive text from your partner.
In fiction, this means tension doesn’t require a gun or a chase scene. It can be built on what a character believes might happen: being found out, losing face, hurting someone they love. If your character feels threatened - socially, emotionally, psychologically - the reader will too.
Tip: Identify what your character is afraid of losing (status, safety, love, control), put it in jeopardy – and make sure the reader can see and understand this.
2. Complex characters often don’t act in their own best interests
In the therapy room, people rarely show up with clear motivations. Or, they might express a motivation (‘I don’t want to be depressed or anxious’) but have understandable difficulty getting on board with the path towards that goal – because it’s hard.
Characters don’t need to be likeable (it’s often said), but the more memorable ones do need to be layered. Often, the richest characters are the ones whose behaviour is coherent, but not always free of contradictions.
Tip: Ask yourself, what does this character do that inadvertently sabotages themself? Put some of that into action by showing the unintended negative consequences of them pursuing (or avoiding pursuing) their goals.
3. ‘Character-driven’ plot doesn’t have to mean ‘boring’
People don’t change in neat arcs. They avoid, recover, slip back. This can lead to characters generating all sorts of interesting plot events.
A believable protagonist reshapes the story through their choices, not just by reacting to events. In turn, they are shaped by those events, and moved along their arc towards its conclusion.
Tip: Let your characters lead. Ask: what type of experience does my character need to have to move them along their arc, and how would they realistically react? This is particularly powerful if you give them a choice that allows them to show what kind of person they are through their behaviour.
4. Emotion: the #1 ‘show don’t tell’ phenomenon
When people feel strong emotions, we will usually notice and express them physically before we articulate them and any underlying thoughts and feelings - if we articulate them at all.
Writers all know we shouldn’t default to naming emotions. Sometimes this shortcut can be appropriate, but often emotion is more powerful when it’s shown through embodiment, action, or subtext.
Tip: Instead of saying ‘he was anxious,’ show him checking the door lock for the third time. Instead of ‘she was sad,’ show her picking at the label on a bottle while everyone else is laughing. Draw on your own experiences, or a tool like ‘The Emotion Thesaurus’, for inspiration.
5. Unconscious: old-fashioned but still there
Many non-psychologists will think of therapy and immediately picture Freud. His family of therapy (‘psychodynamic’) is not the most current anymore, although still widely-practised and with evidence for its effectiveness, but ideas about the unconscious can still offer fiction writers some flavour to add to their characters.
If every character says exactly what they mean and knows exactly what they want, your story might lack depth. Ambiguity, misdirection, and self-deception are realistic and compelling aspects of human behaviour.
Tip: Give your characters blind spots, let them lie to themselves (as well as others), and give them motivations that are the opposite of what they seem to be aiming for e.g. they have a deep desire to be punished for what they did wrong that conflicts with their surface attempt to avoid justice. (This may be easier to do in certain point-of-views, for example close third - as I use in Flat 401- where there is more potential for narratorial comment on a character’s behaviour.)
Offering therapy and writing fiction both benefit from asking the same question: why do people do what they do? If you can answer that honestly, your characters will feel real and provide you with a whole load of material to drive your story forwards.
Let’s face it - there’s nothing like a good plot twist. That delicious moment when your jaw drops, your brain short-circuits, and you immediately flip back a few pages muttering, “Wait, WHAT?”
Contrary to popular belief, plot twists are NOT just for crime writers. Whether you're working on a thriller, a romance, a fantasy epic, or even a literary darling, the plot twist is the literary version of a mic drop - and readers absolutely eat it up.
But why do we love plot twists so much? And more importantly, how do you pull one off without making readers roll their eyes so hard they sprain something?
Let’s twist again, like we did last chapter... (Ba du dum.)
Why plot twists are so addictive
Plot twists are the espresso shot in your story cappuccino. They jolt readers awake. They make people text their friends at 2 a.m. with “YOU NEED TO READ THIS BOOK.” They’re proof that the author is five steps ahead, cackling behind the scenes, and we love being fooled like that.
A good twist does three things:
Surprises the reader
Makes sense in hindsight
Changes the direction or emotional tone of the story.
When done well, twists make readers feel smart for spotting the clues - or wonderfully blindsided if they didn’t. Either way, it’s a win.
Plot twists across genres
You don’t have to write a psychological thriller to serve up a killer twist (though, let’s be real, they practically require one).
Here's how to tailor twists to different genres:
Crime / Thriller / Mystery
The plot twist is your bread and butter here.
Classic moves: The killer was the narrator. The victim faked their death. The detective was the criminal.
Pro tip: Leave breadcrumbs, but scatter them wide enough that readers miss the loaf. For more advice on pulling this off perfectly, be sure to check out our Crime Writing For Beginners video course with Graham Bartlett. Alternatively, if you’re after that extra level of support, consider our tutored Writing Crime and Thriller Novels course (starting 1 September)...
Romance
Yes, even swoony stories can twist the knife!
Twisty moments: The love interest has a secret past. That “adorable” meet-cute was orchestrated. The breakup wasn’t what it seemed.
Pro tip: Just make sure the twist doesn’t ruin the happy-ever-after (unless you’re writing a Nicholas Sparks-style tragedy… in which case, proceed with tissues).
Fantasy
In a world of dragons and dark lords, you’ve got room to get weird.
Magical twists: The chosen one isn’t who you think. The villain was protecting something all along. That magical artifact that they’ve been trying to rescue? Cursed.
Pro tip: Even in wild worlds, logic matters. A twist should still follow the rules of your universe.
Sci-fi
Twists in sci-fi can get existential.
Mind-benders: The AI is sentient. The alien planet is actually Earth. The time travel loop has already happened.
Pro tip: Your twist should spark a philosophical “Whoa...” and a plot “Aha!”
Literary & Historical Fiction
A subtle shift can hit just as hard as a big reveal.
Quiet gut punches: A character’s perception is proven false. A backstory unravels everything.
Pro tip: Here, it’s all about emotional resonance. Make us feel something deeply, even if nobody dies or time-travels.
How to pull off a killer plot twist (without killing your story)
1. Know the ending first
Start with the twist, then build the story around it. It’s much easier to foreshadow something when you actually know what you’re foreshadowing. If you’ve already written a decent chunk of your story and you want to add a twist in, you can do that too, but make sure you go back and pepper the foreshadowing in.
2. Play fair
Readers love to be tricked, but they hate being cheated. If your twist relies on information you never gave the reader access to, it’ll feel like a cheap shot. They need to be able to read back on what they’ve already read and think ‘Oh! How did I miss that?’
3. Layer the clues
Drop hints like a sneaky little breadcrumb trail. Some readers will catch them, others won’t—but either way, they’ll love looking back and realizing you totally warned them.
4. Hide the twist in plain sight
Use misdirection. Distract readers with a more obvious mystery so they miss the real one coming. (See also: every good magician ever.)
5. Let the twist change something
The best twists don’t just shock—they reshape the entire story. They change how we view the characters, the world, even the genre at times.
Look, writing a great twist is like performing a magic trick. You need timing, precision, sleight of hand, and a flair for drama. But when you get it right? Readers will never forget the moment their brain short-circuited - and they’ll come begging for your next book.
So go ahead. Lie to your readers (but nicely). Trick them. Flip the script.
Because at the end of the day, we all want to be fooled—just as long as the twist is earned.
Once you’ve submitted your manuscript – for a critique, or even to an editor – you will receive a number of responses. Amongst the most common is: “But I just didn’t like the main character.” This can be very dispiriting to hear, particularly if you’ve put enormous amounts of effort into your hero. But if somebody feels it, there’s a good chance that they’re right.
The tricky thing, of course, is understanding what it is that makes a character likeable. A corollary to this is “relatable”. There is a maxim that a reader must be able to “relate” to a main character; that is, put him or herself into that character’s shoes. I don’t particularly subscribe to this theory – I no more relate to Achilles in the Iliad than I do to Dorothea in Middlemarch – but I still want to read about them. However, this is something that concerns editors and readers alike, and in order to work within the modern book market, it's absolutely something that must be considered.
It is also the case that you want your protagonist to be human: that is, to err, to be impulsive, jealous sometimes, angry when things don’t go well. Think of Bridget Jones and her pratfalls. A character who is entirely good is simply flat, like a pious child in a Victorian children’s book.
There are many examples of protagonists whose very weaknesses are what make us empathise with them: this is often the case in tragedy. Othello’s jealousy is something we can understand, and in him we see it extending far beyond the usual bounds. Yet we also see someone whose jealousy we don’t understand: that is, the villain, Iago.
What’s the difference? It’s the age-old distinction between protagonist and antagonist. They will have similar qualities: bravery, quick-wittedness perhaps, intelligence certainly. But it’s how they use those qualities which compels us either to like or to despise them. If the intelligence is used for selfish or cowardly ends, as with Iago, then we hate him; if the intelligence is blinded by love, as with Othello, then we empathise and, indeed, sympathise.
Here are some pointers, then, to consider, when you’re crafting your likeable protagonist.
1. Situation
Your character can be in a position of power, or in a more relative position of weakness. It is often suggested that protagonists in positions of power are not “relatable”. Again, I don’t like this line of thought, as fiction is about exploring other worlds, including those of people who hold power. We need to be able to explore what the rich think, as well as the poor; all minds and all milieus are the realm of fiction.
However, it’s still important to render your protagonist likeable within that role. A king can be kindly, for example, and still be a king – and through him, we can still explore what it means to be a king.
Resist the temptation to put your character in a bad situation simply in order to engender sympathy. Writers can go too far in this direction, by loading misfortunes onto the protagonist. Keep it straightforward and remember that it’s about emotional connection: we want the protagonist to be in a better place by the end, which means psychologically, not necessarily in physical terms.
2. Actions
In order to be likeable, the protagonist should...
2. Actions
In order to be likeable, the protagonist should engage our sympathy with a selfless act.
I always think about Aladdin in the Disney film of that name. At the start, he steals from a stallholder. As an adult, you can’t help but think that stealing is wrong, and that he’s therefore a bad egg. But then, almost immediately, he sees two hungry children, and gives them the apple, and bingo – we like him. He goes hungry, and the fault to the stallholder diminishes.
You can also have a rude protagonist, but if they help someone or give something up for a selfless reason, immediately it makes the reader connect. Children's books have been exploring this recently: Frances Hardinge does a good line in spiky female heroines who speak their mind.
3. Vitality
Too often, in manuscripts, I see characters who don’t make decisions, who are flat and lifeless on the page. Make sure that your main character is taking the reins: thinking things through, looking ahead and moving towards that final point. This, too, will make your reader engage, and will lead them onwards to the end.
You must also link the character's development to the main plot. When the events of the plot are reached, the protagonist should be tested, and in being tested, gain our sympathy. This can be moral as well as physical: the king can give away his treasure; the soldier can fight a dragon; the nurse can save the patient.
Always remember: you must like your main character as well. Try to get to know them in as well-rounded a way as possible; and if you love your protagonist, your readers will, too.
You’ve completed a draft of a novel? Congratulations! That’s a huge achievement and one you should celebrate. But now the hard work starts because the first draft of anything is crap.
We all work in different ways but fiddling with every word you write in a first draft can kill your creativity. If you invest too much time in perfecting your prose early on, you may find it harder to murder those carefully crafted darlings when you come to edit and realise that whole scene serves no purpose.
But a first draft is also perfect simply because it exists, and now you have something to work on. Exciting, right?
1. Start with the big picture and ask yourself some searching questions
What is this book?
Where will it sit in bookshops? Is it crime, fantasy, romance? Literary or commercial?
Who are your target readers? What are you offering them that is different from every other novel in that genre?
Now zoom into the specifics of your book...
Title
Elevator pitch and blurb
Synopsis.
These things help you to define the identity of your novel – and everything in the draft should expand from that central identity. A synopsis is particularly useful for establishing the spine of your story, the pivots and the turning points – as well as highlighting any sub-plots and diversions you may decide to get rid of.
2. Look at the structure
Where does your story start?
If the first line of your synopsis refers to something that happens three or four chapters into your draft, that’s probably a sign you have started your story too early and have written your way in. Don’t panic! Nothing is ever wasted in creative writing. Those chapters were there because you, the author, needed them – but the reader doesn’t, so they have to go.
It’s also possible to start your story too late, e.g., when you’re desperate to grab the reader’s attention on the first page - so the story starts with a bang but then the next chapter moves to backstory. The first chapter promises something which then isn’t fulfilled. In this case, it might be better to start the story earlier in time.
Where does it end?
Somewhere close to the end, there should be a peak to your narrative arc: the point where everything is at its most endangered, when everything could be won or lost, and the stakes are at their highest.
After that, the resolution has to be credible as a believable result of everything we’ve seen so far. It also needs to satisfy your target readers. If you’re writing crime, fans of the genre will expect the bad guys to be held to account at the end. In romance, fans want the happy couple to be together on the last page, having overcome all the obstacles you gave them to handle. But resist the temptation to tie up every thread too neatly. Allow readers to imagine that your characters carry on living after the story ends.
How do you get from the beginning to the end?
Are you writing in a linear, chronological timeline? This works well because things happen to the characters at the same time as the reader experiences them, giving us the best chance to relate to your main characters.
If you’re not showing the action chronologically (e.g., using parallel timelines, or a circular structure) make sure the reader always knows where they are in the timeline and how one scene fits in with the ones we’ve seen before.
Between the beginning and end of your novel, your plot should be a series of peaks and troughs. After any intense action, the characters – and the readers – need a chance to draw breath before they have to deal with a new obstacle. Think in terms of cause and effect, action and consequence, fortunately/unfortunately.
3. Identify the narrative drive
Every scene has to push your story forward in some way or another. Look at each scene, or unit of action, and identify the narrative triangle by writing the following in three sentences:
Where you start
What happens
Where you end up.
If both the plot and the characters are in the same place at the end of the scene as they were at the beginning, that’s a sign the pace has stalled and that scene is not earning its keep.
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4. Now think about your characters
They are the reader’s representatives in this fictional world. You will need at least one main character who carries us through from beginning to end, but not so many that the reader doesn’t know who to focus on or root for.
Plot and character should be inextricably interwoven. At the beginning of each new scene, ask yourself:
What does the character want here?
What do they do to get it?
What gets in the way?
What are the consequences and the next link in the chain?
5. Make sure you understand how voice, POV and psychic distance work
Watch out for any head-hopping and make sure we experience the action through the characters’ perceptions, using not just their senses but also sharing their internal reactions.
6. The final polish
Only start the fine detail of checking that each and every word is carefully chosen, and your prose has a pleasing rhythm, once everything else is in place.
Month two equals Point of View. An important moment in all writers’ lives: with our fingers pausing above the keyboard, our characters’ voices in our mind’s ear, we have to choose how to represent them on the page. Will the character be an ‘I’, a ‘he’ or a ‘she’? Maybe they’ll even be a ‘you’.
More decisions: who is the narrator? You - the author, or a character? And how far from the story do they stand as they relate your tale? Are they in the present moment, or in the future describing the past, or even in the past or present describing the future?
It’s true, Point of View is a technical decision, and a defining one. As my tutor, Andrew Miller, says, it can feel a bit ‘under the bonnet’. I liken it to the moment a builder digs foundations, setting the exact footprint and structure of the house. It can be altered if later you decide to change things… but it’ll cost you. Best to be secure in your choice of how many rooms and floor-levels before the concrete footings get poured.
I’ve been paying close attention to the tutorials and reading material, figuring out how my two main characters are turning up on the page and trying out different options. Instead of first person, how do they sound in third person close? The effort is paying dividends. I’ve decided to stick with my first instinct – a character narrator in first person peripheral, telling the story of the other character in third person close. Now that I have learned the techniques, listened to the lectures on pros vs cons, I’m able to append my “Err, because I want to” gut feeling with considered justification. And that, my friends, has definitely helped my confidence.
Confidence is important in this strange and sublime world of conjuring beauty through words on a page. In The Writing Life, Annie Dillard suggests painting, unlike writing, pleases the senses while you do it. Indeed! When I am adrift, suffering doubt and imposter syndrome, I have often thought how lucky painters are. What relief it would be to back up one step and see all of it – the whole novel, its brilliance and its weaknesses – and know immediately how to improve it. Reading Annie’s words made me think of the often quoted, “writing is easy, you just sit at the typewriter and bleed”. Whoever it was that actually said this (Quote Investigator steers us away from it being the great Hemingway) I reckon I know the feeling.
What’s this got to do with Point of View month? Well, I find I am able to push my imposter syndrome demon a little further away every time I improve my technical skills. Gaining a sense of accomplishment - of capability - when it comes to the methodical building blocks of writing gives me solid foundations on which I may play and push my limits. Practicing writing in each point of view means I can demonstrate the benefits of one versus another to myself – and it’s a reminder that this is a key aspect of being a writer I will always have control over: working on my skills.
Annie Dillard also quotes an unnamed, well-known writer who is asked by a university student, “Do you think I could be a writer?”
“Well,” the well-known writer said, “I don’t know… Do you like sentences?”
I do. Sentences and words. This is the level I like to play in, where I feel happiest. This is why month two of the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme, in all its technical, structural glory, has been fun. There’s been lots and lots of fascinating insights from the tutors, many excellent exchanges between fellow students and access to a huge well of writing masterclasses.
Imposter syndrome nerves still lie ahead of me on my road to publication – the thought of trying to sell my writerly wares to the publishing gatekeepers gives me regular heebie-jeebies. But that’s a story for another month – in fact it’ll be the last third or so of the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme’s year when I’ll get expert schooling in the art of confidently querying literary agents.
For now, from my point of view (written in first person central, present tense, with a sprinkling of second person) it is becoming very clear that structure, support and plenty of hand holding is the Ultimate way.
I hope you’ll pop by next month when the topic will be ‘Setting’.
Happy writing, all!
Rachel
Rachel Davidson is a long-term Premium Member of Jericho Writers prior to joining our Writer Support Team, Rachel loves helping hopeful writers, such as herself, to solve their problems and take a step or two closer to achieving their writing dreams. Rachel has previously self-published a trilogy, the first of which achieved bestseller status in fourteen Amazon categories in the UK, US, Australia and Canada and is now seeking her traditional publishing debut with her latest manuscript. You can find out more about Rachel via her Instagram @RachelDavidsonAuthor.
If I can win a writing competition, then you can too.
I received notification that I was in the Friday Night Live (but on Saturday) Final at London Festival of Writing on 21 June 2024. I was visiting Italica, an ancient Roman city just north of Seville in Spain, when the email landed. Later that evening, as the sun dipped towards the horizon, I was perched on a golden beach in Algorrobo Costa watching successions of waves fold over before spilling onto the shore. In my journal – it goes everywhere with me – I wrote:
“Friday Night Live (FNL) – I’m one of the lucky eight. How did that happen?”
Back in 2022, I entered First 500, Jericho’s online competition, with a much less polished opening of my novel. That piece was Highly Commended, though not in the final. But it was encouraging. Much writing time passed.
I completed Jericho’s Ultimate Novel Writing Programme (UNWP) in Spring 2024. And signed up for my first ever Festival of Writing (LFOW). I drafted my historical novel, MANUMISSION*, during the course. I remember preparing my First 500 words carefully before entering FNL. After all, every writer knows their opening page is vital to hook readers with a clear setting and atmosphere, questions raised, and most importantly, a character that readers can invest in. I entered FNL without expectations. For me, it’s easier to set expectations low, rather than be disappointed I didn’t win.
London Festival of Writing 2024 was a fantastic experience. On the day of the Grand Final, I immersed myself in fantastic workshops, learning so much my brain was fit to explode with new ideas. I revealed my horrid imposter syndrome to fellow writers only to discover this is totally normal and affects many creative people. At one point, I took myself off to practice my piece. I read it aloud, slowed the pace, and really thought about what the words meant to me.
The competition took place before the gala dinner. The room was enormous, set for a banquet, and full of people. Finalists were called to the stage in turn to read their work. There’s a special magic forged when a writer’s words fall into the space between them and their audience. After reading, literary agents on the panel gave each finalist generous feedback. Many of us received full manuscript requests. Amazing!
When MANUMISSION won, Debi Alper congratulated me and told me to remember to breathe, the best advice. I’m still grateful and astonished that fellow writers voted for my work. That was the first time I read to a live audience in the room, although I have previously read at online events. Nerves on the day were alleviated by my amazing writing group. Thank you, gang! We were all mentored by Dr Anna Vaught on the UNWC. Friends for life now. We cheer each other on.
Being a FNL winner is an incredible honour, but it also has practical benefits. Two literary agents wish to see my novel when it is ready. I’ve used the prize to help me grapple with tricky structural and line edits. I’m currently on the fourth editing round. My novel is creeping closer to becoming the book I first envisioned.
If you are going to the next LFOW (and you should go – it’s a transformative experience), you are eligible to enter FNL. Believe in your story, hone your opening page, and share it with trusted readers for valuable constructive feedback. Then work on it, and work on it some more. And enter the competition.
I wish you GOOD LUCK!
Kate Sheehan-Finn
*A bit about my book:
At the heart of MANUMISSION, a historical epic set in the second century AD ancient Roman Empire, is an overarching question: who is Barates of Palmyra? This question arose when I first read the bilingual inscription that Syrian Barates commissioned to commemorate his Romano-British wife and freed slave, Regina of the Catuvellauni. The memorial was set up in Arbeia, South Shields, near Newcastle Upon Tyne, in Northeast England. So, what was a Syrian man doing in Britain more than 1800 years ago? MANUMISSION jumps into the gaping holes in the historical and archaeological record to recreate Barates’ adventures.
We’ve all read sentences that made us pause; not because the words moved us profoundly, but because they didn’t sit right. Recently, I read a mystery novel that stereotyped all Hindus as being vegetarian, stating that their homes smelled of garlic and spices. Being a Hindu myself, this didn’t resonate well. I eat most things and I’d like to the think the Coastal Breeze and Wild Rhubarb diffusers I’ve scattered around my home make it smell heavenly! Stereotypes like these are based on assumptions, give readers false impressions and beliefs, and don’t reflect people’s individuality or full humanity.
Whether you’re writing a heart-racing historical romance book, a moving memoir, a corporate blog post or a non-fiction book about the Empire, readers want authenticity. People want to see themselves, their culture, their identity and their experience reflected accurately. Editing with empathy is a responsible way to ensure writing is accurate and respectful across all genres.
What is Authenticity Editing?
It reviews the way marginalised groups, identities, cultures and experiences are portrayed in creative work (e.g. book, script, game, movie, marketing, adverts), and is usually done when creators are exploring unfamiliar topics. For example, if a character has autism and the writer has no experience of this, they can work with an authenticity expert who has autism to accurately represent it.
Authenticity editing uncovers unconscious bias, stereotypes, offensive content, clichés and inaccurate facts that writers unintentionally include.
Why does it matter?
Everyone has the creative freedom to write what they want. You don’t have to follow Mark Twain’s famous piece of writing advice and ‘write what you know’ to avoid being criticised; instead, ‘write what you don’t know’ but do it responsibly and respectfully.
Writers might thoroughly research resources to understand the unfamiliar, but even the well-intentioned writer can get things wrong – a shame when so much time and emotional investment is poured into writing.
Authenticity editing fills writers’ knowledge-gaps and strengthens their work with lived perspectives, ensuring that the language is used contextually, carefully and responsibly to minimise misrepresentation and harmful depictions.
Is Authenticity Editing a form of ‘book policing’?!
Authenticity editing doesn’t have the power to censor books – the publishing house makes final publication decisions. If representation is poor or harmful, readers might leave negative reviews, critics call out writers on social media or publishers might cancel contracts, leading to reputational risk. Authenticity editing can help writers avoid mistakes that lead to outcry before publishing.
Authenticity Editing matters in every genre
Many people think that authenticity editing is only used to assess race and cultures, but many topics are reviewed which most genres will explore:
Social identities such as race and ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, spirituality and religion, disability, body size, socioeconomic status and neurodiversity.
First-hand experiences that are difficult to portray without experiencing them, e.g. being a carer, fostering or adoption, homelessness, medical conditions, e.g. brain trauma.
Specialist professional knowledge, e.g. armed forces, healthcare or medical sectors, the police and lawyers, need to be portrayed convincingly.
4 tips for editing with empathy
1. Be curious
When you come across anything that’s outside your knowledge and experience, don’t assume or judge - ask questions. Is the portrayal based on stereotypes or clichés? Is your source of research credible and trusted? Instead of basing things on assumptions from Google searches, reach out to specific communities to explore what they say about being represented. What does their lived experience reveal?
2. Collaborate with authenticity editors (aka sensitivity or cultural accuracy readers)
Authenticity editors are ‘critical friends’, offering constructive feedback and expertise from lived perspectives. They have a greater capacity to identify harmful misrepresentation, offensive phrases, inaccuracies or stereotypes than people who are not part of it and are in better positions to suggest changes, helping writers make informed decisions on how to improve and strengthen work.
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2. Collaborate with authenticity editors (aka sensitivity or cultural accuracy readers)
Authenticity editors are ‘critical friends’, offering constructive feedback and expertise from lived perspectives. They have a greater capacity to identify harmful misrepresentation, offensive phrases, inaccuracies or stereotypes than people who are not part of it and are in better positions to suggest changes, helping writers make informed decisions on how to improve and strengthen work.
3. Be conscious of your language
Language evolves, as do the terms used to describe identities, relationships and experiences. Be conscious of outdated and harmful language. Use diversity/inclusive style guides or voices from specific communities to inform your choice of language and keep it contextual. For example, if a character in your work is supposed to be sexist, racist or homophobic and is hurling abuse at another character, this can have a place in the pages as long you make it clear that you don’t personally share views with the unsavoury character. This can be achieved in many ways, e.g. the unpleasant character gets their comeuppance or another character argues against their views.
4. Embrace the feedback!
When feedback reveals problematic language or areas of concern, embrace it as an opportunity to learn more about your own unconscious biases and the areas you’re writing about, rather than being defensive. This adds to your growth as a writer and a human being, which will lead to inclusive writing in future that will resonate with more readers.
Ever been to a bookstore and wondered what all the little images on the book spines mean? All those H's, penguins and sowers lining the shelves? Well, they are the logos of the publishing companies who have published that book.
Take a look at the rows of books in any bookstore and you will most probably be looking at the emblems for the Big 5 publishers and their many imprints, as well as a smattering of independent (indie) publishers.
With so many amazing publishing houses out there, the perfect home for you book may well be out there, but how do you know where to look, and who are the most reputable?
In this article we will be looking at the very best book publishers, how publishing companies work, and how to get published by a traditional publishing house.
The publishing industry can be a little tricky to understand, but by the end of this article you will be armed with all the knowledge you need when it comes to choosing the best book publishing companies for your work.
How Do You Search For A Publisher?
Finding a book publisher can be hard, especially if you're hoping to be traditionally published by some of the top publishers in the business. Where do you begin, and what information is important for you to know before you start submitting your manuscript to some of the largest book publishers? Is there anything to be said for self publishing, and what types of publishing should you avoid?
Do I Need A Literary Agent?
Yes, you will most likely need to be represented by a literary agent before you (via your agent) can start submitting to bigger traditional publishers. Nevertheless, there’s no harm in window shopping; it might even provide you with a focal point if you are still working on getting an agent.
For more information on how to find a literary agent, read more here.
Where To Start
If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the number of book publishers out there, I’ll be listing the top five biggest publishing houses, some of the best educational publishers and those who publish children’s books, as well as some of my personal favourite independent book publishers.
Read on to discover the very best publishers, covering all book genres across the globe.
The Big Five Book Publishers
While aiming high can be daunting to some authors, literary agents will often wish to submit your manuscript to the top publishing companies first. After all, not only do they have the most power and influence, but they also know what they're doing - most of them have been publishing books for over a hundred years!
Who Are The Big Five?
The biggest and most successful traditional publishers in the world are often referred to as 'The Big Five'. So I will be starting with them.
These are the five powerhouse trade publishing houses which are most well known and widely recognised. Within them you will find many other recognised imprints (publishing houses owned by them) whose logos appear on the spine on the book.
Let’s take a look at them in more detail.
Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster is where we begin our big five journey, as this publishing company holds an annual revenue of $830 million. They have over 35 imprints, including notable ones such as Howard Books, Scribner, and Touchstone, and they release over 2,000 books a year! Some of their biggest titles as of late are Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat and The Institute by Stephen King.
Founded in 1924, Simon & Schuster remains a prominent publisher today, publishing a variety of genres along with big names such as renown authors F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jodi Picoult and Philippa Gregory.
They also offer many opportunities for those wanting to pursue a career in publishing and are one of the biggest names in the industry to work.
HarperCollins
With an annual revenue of $1.5 billion, HarperCollins has no shortage of good books and authors.
Their notable imprints include Avon Romance, Harlequin Enterprises, Harper, and William Morrow, and their titles range broadly. Some of the top books as of late are Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis and The Last Romantics by Tara Conklin.
Authors published originally by Harper include Mark Twain, the Brontë sisters, H. G. Wells and Agatha Christie. A book deal from this giant will most certainly help with book sales!
Established in 1843, Macmillan Publishers is still going strong.
With $1.4 billion in annual revenue, there are many publishing routes and imprints available through them, namely Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Picador, St Martin's Press, and Thomas Dunne Books.
Some of their biggest titles from the recent past that you may have heard of include The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah and Me by Elton John.
With an eclectic list of authors under its belt (from W B Yeats to Leigh Bardugo), and a global market with countless possible genres to publish under, you’d be wise to consider them an ideal place for your book to end up.
Penguin Random House
Everyone recognises that little penguin on book spines in bookstores, and everyone is familiar with the orange Penguin Classics books, but what else do you know about this iconic publisher?
With over 15,000 books published a year, not only is Penguin Random House one of the top five, it may well be the top of the top five.
Their annual revenue exceeds $3.3 billion, and they have countless notable imprints such as Knopf Doubleday, Crown Publishing, and Viking Press. They also have many famous authors under their wing, including books like The Testaments by Margaret Atwood, and The Guardians by John Grisham.
As of 2021, Penguin Random House employs approximately 10,000 people globally and has published 15,000 titles annually under its 250 divisions and imprints.
Hachette Livre
Looking for a European based publisher with more published books a year than Penguin? Then take a look at the Hachette book group.
Hachette Livre has an annual revenue of $2.7 billion and nearly 200 imprints. Some of these include Grand Central Publishing, Little, Brown and Company, Headline, and Mulholland Books.
Their biggest titles in the recent past include Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell and Little Weirds by Jenny Slate. they have also published names such as James Patterson, Martina Cole, Donna Tartt, and Celeste Ng.
Growing steadily since their merger in 1992, Hachette Livre has a lot to offer both you and your book.
Best Educational Book Publishers
Looking for a reliable and quality educational book publisher, or someone who specialises in nonfiction titles?
This can be more difficult than you think, but thankfully I’m here to shorten the list for you. These publishers are looking specifically for educational books, quality hardback textbooks and the like.
This won't be helpful if you're looking to get your fictional manuscript published, but if it's educational materials you write, then read on!
Bertelsmann Education Group
Bertelsmann is a media, services and education company that operates in about 50 countries around the world. The online education and service offerings are primarily in the healthcare and technology sectors, as well as in higher education. With an annual revenue of around $300 million, this group has no shortage of educational texts, resources, and reliable online connections.
Scholastic
I can’t recall how many Scholastic book fairs I went to as a child. Perhaps you went to some as well, given that Scholastic is both an educational publisher and a popular children’s publisher.
Their book sales are always consistent and their annual revenue is roughly $1.7 billion. Their notable imprints include Arthur A. Levine, Klutz Press, and Orchard Books. While their educational books are extremely popular for grades K-12, their YA fiction remains the most popular (no doubt you’ve heard of Harry Potter and The Hunger Games, right?).
Pearson Education
Have you ever used DuoLingo for your language learning needs? Did you know that Pearson Education has recently partnered with them?
There’s a lot of other notable mentions surrounding Pearson, such as their annual revenue of $1 billion, and their well-known imprints (Adobe Press, Heinemann, Prentice Hall, Wharton Publishing). Their most popular publications are always subject textbooks for higher education, and for good reason.
McGraw-Hill Education
One of the largest publishers in American education is Mcgraw-Hill. Their annual revenue often exceeds $1.7 billion, and they are well known for their many editions of test prep books (SAT and ACT) and elementary school math textbooks.
Their most notable imprints include Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, Macmillan/McGraw-Hill, and McGraw-Hill Higher Education, no doubt familiar to you if you’ve been involved in any American education system.
Wiley
While Wiley has a lot to offer in terms of non-educational publishing, their For Dummies series of educational books is one of their top sellers.
With an annual revenue of $1.7 billion, their various instructional titles are big hits in the publishing world. Their most notable imprints include Bloomberg Press, Capstone, Hungry Minds, and Wiley-Blackwell, and they continue to publish a large variety of titles, both educational and otherwise.
Cengage Learning
Publishing both hard cover print books and maintaining a dedicated digital library can be difficult, but Cengage learning can do it all.
From imprints that publish specifically for grades K-12 as well as books for higher education learning, Cengage is a wonderful publisher to consider. Cengage is also the owner of the National Geographic Education division, made to bring excitement to classrooms worldwide.
With an annual revenue of $1.7 billion, it’s safe to say that this publisher is one of the educational publishing powerhouses.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
You may have already heard of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, or HMH for short.
This publisher specializes in different disciplines including business and economics, biography and memoirs, children’s books, cookbooks, health and wellness, and more. They make more than $1.4 billion annually, with many notable imprints: Clarion, Graphia, John Joseph Adams Books, and Sandpiper among them.
Their largest and most recent titles include elementary school textbooks in all subjects, as well as cookbooks.
Best Children’s Book Publishers
Some of the top selling books published today are for children or young adults. However, writing and publishing for children and young adults can be a lot harder than you would think!
Although young adult novels have really flown off the shelves in the last twenty years, and often offer the most variety in terms of diversity, content and audience, young adult fiction, middle grade fiction and picture books still remain one of the most competitive markets in the publishing world.
Here are some of the best choices for children’s book publishing today, and how you can reach out to them (via your literary agent, of course).
Bloomsbury
With offices around the world and prominent publishing houses in both the US and the UK, Bloomsbury Books is a top contender for children’s book publishing (they also publish a vast array of nonfiction books including political nonfiction).
Established in 1986, Bloomsbury has many popular children’s book authors across every age group. With an annual revenue of $150 million, Bloomsbury USA Books for Young Readers was established in 2002. Their YA fiction has grown increasingly popular, their authors often topping the New York Times Bestseller list.
If they're good enough for the likes of J K Rowling, Sarah J Maas, and Samantha Shannon, then I'm sure your book will be more than happy in this home.
Ladybird Books
It's impossible for anyone over the age of thirty to not have fond memories of their first Ladybird hardback book as a child. Who doesn't remember their favourite fairytales presented in that iconic little book with a plump ladybird on the cover?
UK-based and another division of the Penguin Group, Ladybird books is perfect if you’ve got a bedtime story to tell. Their lineup of children’s books is primarily geared toward younger audiences, from toddlers to roughly age ten. They have many award winning series published under their name, including many Peppa Pig books, as well as an educational division with their famous Peter and Jane reading guides and other titles where they have teamed up with names such as BBC Earth.
Their annual revenue is roughly $17 million.
Chronicle Books
San Francisco-based favourite Chronicle Books, with a $10 million revenue, has a wonderful eye for the unique and aesthetic storyteller.
Their children’s books are beloved and unique, and this small independent publisher receives more than 1,000 submissions a month for their young adult department alone! They publish most type of children’s books including activity books, art books, board books, picture books, chapter books, middle grade, games, and gift and stationery items.
Hogs Back Books
Hogs Back Books publishes fiction books aimed at children up to 10, as well as early readers for children up to 14, and teenage fiction.
Amongst its most notable titles, Boris the Boastful Frog was recommended by The Telegraph in 2013 as one of the best books of the year for young children. They are a small family-owned and independent publisher, and the small selection that they choose to publish is beautiful and heartfelt.
Arbordale Publishing
With just about $1 million in annual income, Arbordale Publishing isn’t the largest in US children’s publishing. However, their books are aligned to Common Core, Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), as well as state education standards.
Arbordale books are vetted by experts and professionals from a variety of organizations including NASA, JPL, Project Learning Tree, USFWS, SeaWorld, the Cherokee Nation and others. They publish an average of 20 books per year.
Immedium
Based in San Francisco, CA, Immedium is influenced by an increasingly diverse world. While they are a small company and make an average of $150k in annual revenue, they have wonderful illustrations and ideas for children’s books.
Immedium publishes subjects range from eye-catching children’s books to contemporary non-fiction, including commentaries on art, popular culture, and multicultural issues.
Kids Can Press
Kids Can Press is a Canadian-owned publisher of children’s books, with a list of over 500 picture books, non-fiction and fiction titles for toddlers to young adults and an estimated annual revenue of over $10 million.
The Kids Can Press list includes characters such as Franklin the Turtle—the single most successful publishing franchise in the history of Canadian publishing, which has sold over 65 million books in over 30 languages around the world.
Publishing only around 25 books a year, Quirk Books is based in Philadelphia and is searching for the most original, cool, and fun ideas out there. Is your book creative enough for Quirk? It’s one of my favourite publishing companies, having taken the helm on series such as the Miss Peregrine anthology by Ransom Riggs, which has won many literary awards.
August House Publishers
A more traditional publishing company, August House Publishers are seeking children’s book authors committed to folktales, diverse and memorable. They enjoy stories from many diverse backgrounds, as well as stories that work well as oral tales, stories meant to be passed on from generation to generation. They also have a soft spot for scary stories and stories that can be used in a classroom environment.
With almost $50 million a year in revenue ABDO is a formidable children’s book publisher.
Based in Edina, Minnesota, this family-owned book publishing company specializes in non-fiction books for the school library market. From engaging nonfiction to illustrated titles, ABDO has both educational and fantastical book titles for children of all ages.
Best Independent Book Publishers
Are you looking for a smaller company to publish your book? This is a better option if you are still seeking a traditional publishing company, but want to work with them directly
There are many benefits of working with an independent book publishing company. Smaller companies often accept unsolicited submissions (ie you don't need to have a literary agent and can approach them yourself), especially if the submission is more unique and experimental in nature.
Plus, independent publishers often offer a more hands-on approach for new and inexperienced authors. the downside is that their budgets and reach may not be as large as that of the big five, so you are less likely to get an astronomical advance or become an international bestseller. But it's not impossible!
Let’s check out some of the best in the business...
Autumn House Press
Autumn House Press is an independent, non-profit literary publishing company based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania that was founded in 1998. They began as a publishing company strictly for poetry, but they have since expanded to include fiction and nonfiction.
Autumn House Press’s especially notable titles include Anxious Attachments by Beth Alvarado and Not Dead Yet and Other Stories by Hadley Moore.
Tupelo Press
Tupelo Press is an American not-for-profit literary press founded in 1999. It produced its first titles in 2001, publishing poetry, fiction and nonfiction. Tupelo Press publishes the winners of its national poetry competitions, as well as manuscripts accepted through general submission. Awards given by Tupelo Press include the Dorset Prize, the Berkshire Prize for a First or Second Book of Poetry, and the Snowbound Series Chapbook Award. They have a lot to offer as an independent book publisher.
Influx Press
Hackney-based London independent publisher, Influx Press, was founded in 2011. They focus on site-specific literature closely linked to precise places across the UK and beyond.
They have printed unique books such as How Pale the Winter Has Made Us by Adam Scovell and A Door Behind a Door by Yelena Moskovich.
Fledgling Press
Fledgling is an exciting and innovative publisher founded in Edingburgh, Scotland. Their focus is primarily on Scottish talent, but they still consider writers from other parts of the world.
Founded in 2000, Fledgling Press have have launched the writing careers of award winning authors including Helen Grant, Philip Caveney and Alex Nye.
Graywolf Press
Graywolf Press is an independent, non-profit publisher located in Minneapolis, Minnesota. They publish fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Graywolf Press currently publishes about 27 books a year, including the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize winner, the recipient of the Emily Dickinson First Book Award, and several translations supported by the Lannan Foundation. Their published work is bold and award winning.
New Directions
New Directions was founded in 1936 and they publish about 30 new titles a year. They publish anything regarding literary fiction, poetry, memoir, nonfiction, and their annual revenue is roughly $1 million per year.
It was the first American publisher of authors including Henry Miller, Vladimir Nabokov, and Jorge Luis Borges, among others.
Tin House Books
Publisher of award-winning books of literary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry; home to a renowned workshop and seminar series; and partner of a critically acclaimed podcast, Tin House champions writing that is artful, dynamic, and original.
Europa Editions is an independent trade publisher based in New York. The company was founded in 2005 by the owners of the Italian press Edizioni E/O and specializes in literary fiction, mysteries, and narrative non-fiction. They have a few imprints, namely Tonga Books, and a series for mysteries known as Europa World Noir.
City Lights Publishers
Known for publishing Howl and other poems by Allen Ginsberg, City Lights Publishers is a great independent publishing option. Founded in 1955, with nearly 300 books in print, City Lights publishes cutting-edge fiction, poetry, memoirs, literary translations and books on vital social and political issues.
For over fifty years, City Lights has been a champion of progressive thinking, fighting against the forces of conservatism and censorship.
Forest Avenue Press
Forest Avenue Press, founded in 2012 in Portland, Oregon, publishes literary fiction on a joyride and the occasional memoir. While they are currently a small-scale operation, they are growing in popularity in the Pacific Northwest.
And That's Not All Of Them...
And that is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the best publishers to consider! The best thing to do, when looking at what publisher to approach or consider, is to look at the books you love or that are most similar to your own and look at who publishes them.
You may well be surprised, and they may well not even be on this list (which doesn't make them any less fabulous).
A Publisher For Every Writer
Writing a book and finishing it is a huge achievement in itself. Choosing whether to self-publish, look for an agent, or approach indie publishing houses yourself is the next step..and a large one.
So take your time and choose your route to publication wisely. While I hope you found a few excellent book publishers to consider from this list, do keep in mind that there are many more that are worth your consideration. And however you choose to get your book out into the world (and all options come with a list of pros and cons) they all ultimately all lead to the same thing - holding your book in your hand one day and having others enjoy your words.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who Are The Big 5 In Publishing?
The big five publishers in the world are:
Harper Collins
Simon & Schuster
Macmillan
Hachette
Penguin Random House
These five publishers make up over 90% of hardback book sales in the US and over 80% of paperbacks sold.
What Is The Most Prestigious Book Publisher?
In terms of the most established book publisher, Cambridge University Press, dating back to 1534. But in terms of revenue, iPenguin Random House generated revenues of 3.8 billion euros in 2020, up from 3.63 in the previous year.
Which Publisher Is Best For First Time Authors?
The best thing a first time author can do is find a great literary agent that specialises in whatever genre they write. Through that agent they will then have access to the very best publishers. Without an agent, you can't get near the Big 5!
How Do You Pick A Publisher?
To have access to the top publishers you need a literary agent, and they will know who to approach. But if you want to approach smaller publishers without an agent, or just curious as to who you'd like publishing your book, then simply take a look at books that are similar to the one you have written and see who publishes them.
Indie and traditional Basic | Intermediate | Advanced
Launching a book is the most exciting moment in an author’s journey, but it’s also the scariest. You only really appreciate the sheer scale of the competition facing you when you’re getting ready to launch your book into the world.
And launch is confusing too. There are so many strategies out there, but which one is right for you? You can easily feel that you have to do everything – which is impossible – so you end up feeling like a failure before you even start.
So let’s make things clear and simple. We’re going to show you four strategies for how to plan a book launch. They are:
New author (first book launch)
Intermediate author (third book launch)
Advanced author (tenth book launch, let’s say)
Traditionally published author
Obviously, these strategies are guidelines only. If you have specific assets (a well-listened to podcast, for example), then you’re going to make use of them in cross-promoting, no matter where you are in your publishing journey.
Likewise, you have skills and preferences and those need to play a part too. If you just hate tech, you probably aren’t going to get heavily involved in advertising. If you’re great on social media, you’re going to want to be active there. And so on.
In short, what follows is a set of guidelines for you to adapt around who you are. If you don’t follow one exact recipe in what follows, that’s not you being dumb. That’s you intelligently adapting an approach around your specific needs.
Oh, and yes, I know you want to plunge straight in here, but don’t.
The single thing which will most determine the success or failure of your book is the quality of your preparation.
If you’re so impatient to get to launch that you’ve rushed your cover, or your text, or any of the other essentials, you’ll simply be leaving a big fat heap of money on the table for someone else to pick up.
Think of launch as a bucket where you are trying to scoop up as many readers, fans, sales and reviews as possible. If you don’t make damn sure that bucket is sealed and watertight before you start, you are going to leak readers like crazy. You can work like seven devils and still not be rewarded for all your effort.
So before we get to your launch plans, we’re going to run you through a checklist. If you’re solid on all those bullet points, then please proceed to launch. If you’re wobbly on some of the checklist items, then fix those things before doing anything else.
Preparation: it’s boring, but it matters.
Your Book Launch Checklist
So you have an upcoming book, and you feel ready to launch it into the world. Here’s your checklist, organised in rough order of priority.
The Essentials
This first set of bullets are things that you just can’t compromise on. Yes, you can theoretically publish a book if you haven’t done these things, but you can’t do it well. So for a successful book launch, don’t skimp.
Completed text.
Professional editorial review. I’ve put this in italics, just because Jericho Writers offers a very high quality editorial service and we have an obvious interest in boosting editorial services. But I’ve been a pro author for twenty years, and I’ve never once launched a book without a third party editorial review. And you know what? My books have always got better. So: yes, I’m biased. And yes, editorial help makes a difference.
Copy editing / proofreading. Same thing here. You will need help with copyediting, unless you want your book to go out into the world strewn with errors. We also offer copyediting help but honestly? This is an area where you can save money. If you’re friends with an English teacher, or librarian, or anyone else you trust to read a text very closely and pick up errors, then go with that. You DO need a second set of eyes to review your text. You SHOULD save money here if you can. A few errors won’t hurt anyone.
Quality cover. Don’t skimp. Get this right. If you only 95% like the design you have, then go on until you’re at 100%. The first cover you ever make will be the most expensive, because that’s where you’re evolving the strategy for the entire series. Once you have the basic template, your future covers will be easy. But get this right.
Categories and keywords. Get this right: an hour or two’s work upfront will pay dividends for literally years to come.
Front matter. This is the “Look Inside” portion of your e-book. This is where you convert the curious browser into the brand-new reader. So make sure that the front part of your e-book helps that conversion process. You need to be clear about what your book is, and why someone should read it.
End matter. This is so crucial. The platform for all your future launches is the readers you collect from this one. And the place to collect those readers? Is right after they’ve finished your book and are still in a state of focused excitement about it. In particular, the back of your book is the place where you need to (A) offer a free download and (B) solicit reviews.
Free download offer. You need to offer your core readers a freebie. The basic offer is, “Hey, do you want a free story / video explainer / set of cheat sheets / anything else?” Not all readers will engage with that offer, but your best readers WILL engage … and you’ll get their email address … and that email list will form the basis of everything else you do.
Email collection system. You can’t just offer people a free story (or other incentive). You also have to deliver it. That is going to mean you have an author website with the right technology on it, or you are going to use a third party service (like the ever-excellent Bookfunnel) to collect the email address and deliver the book.
Email service provider. You need to be signed up with a Mailchimp or ConvertKit, or some similar company. Those guys are going to collect emails for you, automate emails, send emails, and everything else.
If you need more than that (and you probably do), we have an exceptionally good self-publishing video course. That course is expensive to buy – because it’s really, really good – so don’t buy it. That course, plus a ton of other incredibly good stuff, is available FREE to members of Jericho Writers. And if you’re serious about your writing, we’d love to welcome you as a member. You can find out more about us and how to become a member right here.
The Nice-To-Haves
What follows are things that you may well already have in place, or think you absolutely need. Advanced authors are likely to tick every one of these boxes. For newer authors – well, you can’t do absolutely everything all in a single go. So don’t panic.
Facebook author page. You need to make sure that your profile picture is 100% consistent with your book cover visuals. You need to add content at least weekly and – this is the important bit – that your content is very narrowly focused on your ideal reader. So if you are writing non-fiction about training dogs, then your Facebook page should be very narrowly focused on that topic, and nothing else. If you have to choose between 100 passionate fans and 1000 people half of whom are there for the freebies or the cute puppy pictures, then choose the 100 every time. The “not all that interested” brigade will ruin your engagement metrics and blur your audience definition. Focus matters. Scale doesn’t – or not nearly so much.
Amazon Author Central page. It’s an easy win this one, so you probably want to take care of it. Basically: Amazon lets you build your own author profile on their system. Will it sell books for you? Not really. Maybe a few.
Author website with blog. You'll notice that I DO think you need an email collection system that works, and for most authors the actual story-for-email exchange will be done on their website. But that’s by far the most important element of any author site. If you also want to blog, then do, but it’s no big deal. If you blog, then see what I’ve said above about the Facebook author page. Narrow focus is much, much more important than just grabbing random sets of eyeballs.
Facebook tracking pixel. If you want to use some more advanced ad techniques on Facebook, then you’ll want a tracking pixel on your site, so Facebook (in its incredibly creepy way) can watch when its users visit your site. Even if you don’t use that data now, you probably want to start collecting it, so Facebook can start populating its creepy databases.
Twitter. Oh heck. Some people love Twitter. If you do, then you’re already on it. If you’re not, well, maybe you don’t want to be. I don’t think it sells books, so don’t worry.
The “Why Bother?” List
Somethings that people say you ought to do, you don’t need to do. Including:
Your Goodreads profile
Printing flyers / postcards
Press releases
A launch party. I mean that’s fun, and you should probably have one. But you should have one because it’s fun celebrating with your friends. It’s not a serious book launch technique.
Book trailer. Not much point here, unless you have a significant TikTok audience, or similar.
Giveaways, unless these are very carefully targeted.
OK. Checklist all done and dusted? Then let’s move onto three book launch plans, graded according to author experience. We start easy, and build from there.
A Book Launch Plan For The First Time Author
This is your first book launch. And your first job is to set your expectations appropriately.
You will not make much money from this book. You will not reach many readers. You will not get many reviews. You will probably lose money, if you take into account all your upfront costs.
All the same, this book launch really matters. This first-of-series book is going to be your little ambassador to the Big Wide World. It’s where the majority of all your series readers ever are going to start. So the quality of the book matters. Ditto the number and quality of reviews. The quality of your cover and book description. And so on.
This is your first book and nobody knows you. So this is like one of those little bits of cheese they give you as tasters, when they want you to buy the whole damn cheese. It’s free to nibble, but you pay to gorge. In short: price your book free or at £0.99/$0.99. Or yo-yo between those two price points. Or kick the price up to £4.99/$4.99, so when you slash the price to free, it looks like a great offer to readers.
At this stage, you’re not looking to make revenue. You’re looking to:
Build reviews
Populate your Also Boughts with the right type of readers (more on that in a second)
Collect emails for your mailing list
If you tick those three boxes in a satisfactory way, don’t worry too much if your revenue is small to negligible. You are building a platform for the future.
2. Ask For Reviews
At the end of your book, include a note to the reader that you would love them to review your book. Tell them how to do it and say how much it means to you personally. Those direct appeals really help secure reviews.
Oh, and it probably goes without saying that you should never buy reviews or anything of that sort. Amazon will sniff those things out and send an army of tiny robots to invade your bloodstream and turn your skin yellow.
3. Offer A Free Download
We sort of covered this in the checklist material, but it’s so important I’m going to say it again.
You need to offer your readers a free download. They get a story (or video, or cheat sheet, or whatever). You get their email address and permission to contact them.
This is the rock that stands at the heart of everything else you ever do. Don’t neglect it. Get the details right. You have to make this part work.
4. Friends And Family
It’s fine to ask your friends and family to buy your book and leave an honest review, BUT only ask those people who actually like and regularly read your specific genre. If your mother only ever readers slasher-zombie-horror books and you only write Sweet Romance, then her purchase of your romance book will be an active negative.
How come? Because Amazon needs to understand who the readers of your book are, and if you start, in effect, saying to Amazon “this Sweet Romance book will be enjoyed by readers of Slasher-Zombie-Horror” then Amazon won’t know how to market your book.
Key lesson: A bad sale is worse than no sale at all. Don’t be tempted.
5. Hit Your Email List (If You Have One)
Let’s say you’ve already released a free novella via, for example, Instafreebie. That release will give you a list of email addresses. You can and should go to those people and say, “hey, I’d love you to buy my book [or get the free download]. But in particular, I’d really love it if you left a review for me on Amazon. I’m just starting out in my career and those reviews are invaluable for me – and they’re so helpful to other readers too. Thanks so much.”
6. Go Narrow
Don’t be tempted by Apple and all those other book stores. You are better off going all in on Amazon. Yes, you lose the (pretty meagre) sales available from Apple and co, but in return you gain access to Kindle Unlimited readers, who may easily make up 50% of your income, or even more.
This isn’t even a marginal decision, to be honest with you. When you have 3+ books out and are making $10,000+ in sales revenue, then maybe you have a decision to make. But starting out? Go narrow. You’ll do far better.
7. Don’t Go For Pre-orders
Pre-orders stink.
Why would you want to drive traffic to an Amazon page that has zero reviews and which doesn’t actually let readers get a book on their devices right now this second?
Answer: you wouldn’t. So launch naked. No pre-orders at all, please.
(And yes, there are exceptions to this rule, but if you are a newbie, then you’re not one of them.)
8. AMS Adverts
AMS – Amazon Marketing Services, Amazon’s own in-house ad-platform – is a great but frustrating ad platform.
It’s great, because it’s easy to build ads that convert well and make money. It’s frustrating because the interface is dire and because the ads are really hard to scale. (Unlike on Facebook, where you just have to throw more money at the service.)
But still: AMS ads are great for new authors, because they’re cheap and because the sales and reviews will mount up over time.
(Also, and this post is in part an overview for what works at the moment, Amazon will surely give AMS a much-needed overhaul as currently, the interface is just embarrassingly bad.)
9. Free / Discounted Book Sites
There are sites like Robin Reads, ENT, Freebooksy and others that build large databases of readers interested in free or discounted titles. Those lists are segmented by genre, so if you write Space Opera you won’t be bothering people who only love Cosy Mystery.
You definitely want to drop some money on those sites. Get your book right in front of people specifically looking for titles like yours. And yes, those email lists go to discount hounds, but a lot of those discount hounds are looking for a new series to commit to and enjoy, so they want their “taster” experience to be free (or low cost). Thereafter they’ll be happy to pay full e-book prices.
Oh yes, and while Bookbub is the biggest discounted book site by a mile, you are extremely unlikely to get access to it at this stage in your career. So start smaller and build up.
Expert tip: you probably want to stack promotions if you can. It’s better to drop $300 over several promo sites at the exact same time, than to pay the same money in split promotions. Especially on Amazon, big, bold promos work better than multiple small ones.
Expert tip II: Use the great Nicholas Erik for an always up-to-date guide of which book sites are great and which ones are just meh. Get his insights here.
10. Blog Tours, Etc
I’ve listed this last on the checklist, because I think it’s optional. I don’t think you get a lot of readers from blog tours, soliciting reviews from bloggers, etc.
But – this is your first book. Maybe you just want to get out there and you will get some readers, and those readers are gold dust for you at this stage. So if you want to go for it, go chase around some bloggers in your niche. If you can’t be bothered, then don’t bother – and don’t feel guilty either.
Is all this doing your head in? I’m not surprised. There’s a lot to take in and it can seem overwhelming. The solution for most people will be to take a really good step-by-step course that just walks you through the entire process.
We have just such a course – here – and it’s superb. Inspirational, practical, and lavishly documented. Trouble is, our course, like all the other good uns on the market, is really expensive. So don’t buy it. That course, and a ton of other good stuff, is available totally free to members of Jericho Writers. If you’re serious about your writing & your publishing, then we’d love to have you join us. All the info you need is right here. We look forward to meeting you!
A Book Launch Plan For The Intermediate Author
This is maybe your third or fourth book launch. Some of the strategies above are either second nature to you now, or they’ve dropped away completely. (Approaching friends and family is mostly a first-book-only thing. Ditto blog tours and the like.)
So for your third or fourth book launch, you’re going to use all of the above strategies – where they make sense – and then add / elaborate as follows:
1. Sophisticated Use Of Email Lists
With our first book launch, we just thumped out a “buy my book now” email to the few names we had on our list, and we got what we got.
OK, but that was then. Now we have a stronger list, and we can play things a little more cleverly. Because here’s the thing:
Amazon likes email-driven sales surges (and drives your book high up the bestseller charts as a result).
Amazon LOVES strong and steady sales surges, especially those that continue over four or (play safe) five days.
So, assuming that we have a decently performing list of, let’s say, 2,000 names or more, we’re not just going to bang out a “buy my book” email on the day of launch. Instead, we’re going to divide that list into three or four roughly equal slices, and launch emails on day #1, day #2, day #3, with reminder emails to non-openers on days #3, #4, and #5. (Or something like that. The principle is more important than the exact way you choose to implement it.)
The resulting steady pattern of sales will signal to Amazon that this book isn’t a one-day wonder. There’s real selling strength behind it. That signal will prompt Amazon to work harder, and for longer, than it otherwise would.
This simple, free email strategy remains the most powerful single strategy at your disposal. If you do this well, and little else, you can still achieve great things.
2. Get Reviews From Your Best Readers
Once you are developing your email list nicely, you can go to your best readers and offer them an Advance Review Copy of your forthcoming book, in exchange for a review once they’ve read it. You’re not asking them for fake reviews. You want honest verdicts. But crucially, you want anyone with an ARC to post their review within 48 hours of your book being launched. That’s the part that really, really matters.
How come? Because with all your activity around launch, the visibility of your new title will never be as high as this again (give or take a huge Bookbub promo, perhaps.) That visibility means that a ton of totally new readers will be finding your work for the first time. And that means, you want to populate your page with reviews as soon as humanly possible. Waiting 30-60 days for the reviews to populate organically will slaughter your conversions at the time when your Amazon book page has its maximum levels of traffic.
So get your readers engaged early. And feel free to nudge them. Get the reviews, and get them fast!
3. Series Listings In Your End-matter
The best place to sell your e-books? Your other e-books.
As you start to build out your list, make sure you go back to the e-books you already have out on sale and list all your titles. Make sure that you include the series number and a very short blurb (50-100 words is plenty) for each book. You also, of course, need to include purchase links for each book with link text that’s more tentative (“Find out more”) than pushy (“Buy now!”).
4. Remarketing Ads On Facebook And Google
Both Facebook and Google let you “remarket” to your “almost-but-not-quite” customers.
So Google allows you to push ads at people have who have recently visited your website. Facebook does the same, but also lets you market to specific audience groups – for example, people on your mailing list, or people who didn’t open and click your launch email.
Because these ads are going to a very warm audience, they tend to have an excellent conversion rate, with good CTRs and low CPCs.
Even so, before you start to advertise with any kind of meaningful budget, you do need to test carefully to get the right creative. It remains a lot easier to waste money with ads than it is to make it. Take care!
5. Series-level Promos
Now that you have a series of books to play with, you can get a bit more creative with the way you structure your promos. You should no longer think about promoting a book, but about the series. So if you’re launching #3 in your series, you might want to arrange things like this:
Book #1. Free promo. Use Freebooksy, ENT, and other sites to promote the freebie. Make sure you stack promos to deliver downloads in the necessary volumes.
Book #2. Use a Kindle Countdown deal to earn 70% royalties at £0.99/$0.99. Maybe use some of the other promo sites to support this offer. Maybe try some remarketing ads, using a carousel to display all three of the products you have for sale.
Book #3. Launch, launch, launch! This is where you’re going to spend most of your firepower.
You’ll use your email list to support the launch, of course, but you’ll probably want to draw attention to the other offers too. The more your whole series increases its visibility in Amazon, the more new readers will pour into your series as a whole, with all the lovely readthrough sales you’ll collect over the long term.
6. Think Kindle Unlimited
If you’re still intermediate in terms of sales and list, then you should stick with Kindle Unlimited. It’ll simplify your life, and make you more money.
But you also need to have a KU mindset, because the way you make money on Apple/Kobo/etc is different from the way you’ll earn money on KU. The essence of effective Kindle Unlimited marketing is simple. You want to achieve big bursts of visibility. As much visibility as possible, extended over a minimum of four days, but ideally for a week or even more.
That extended big-burst visibility will earn you money for weeks and weeks. You’ll see a surge in page reads that dies off slowly rather than fast. Granular, drip-drip-drip marketing techniques cannot achieve this effect. On this model, you’d do much better to have a big budget, 0% ROI promotion that really lifts visibility, than to have a couple of nicely performing little campaigns that achieve decent ROI but don’t really impact visibility.
Rachel Davidson, long-time Jericho Writers Premium Member and now a part of our Writer Support team, is currently studying on the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme. She’s agreed to share her experience of the course with us month by month.
First up: a look at how she made the decision to invest in her writing – and believe in herself...
Hey there – thanks for popping by. Let me introduce myself. I have been a Premium Member with Jericho Writers for many years. I’d give you the precise number, if only I could remember! Suffice to say, Jericho Writers has consistently walked beside me as I traverse the writerly landscape.
More recent times have seen me joining the Jericho Writers team, in Writer Support – which means that for three days a week, I get paid to think about writing, talk about writing and help other writers with their writing. I love it!
And now there’s another big tick on my to-do list. I’ve been accepted onto the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme. The first month’s topic is Planning and Plotting. Well, I’ve been planning and plotting this since the earliest of days. Let me go back to the beginning and tell you my story...
I’ve wanted to be an author since primary school, where I discovered the wonder of writing stories. More than this, I discovered the joy of my stories being read. My teacher was a fan of the tales I wrote: a series of Nancy Drew-esque mysteries which my identical-twin characters solved with surprising ease. He was a kind teacher. I was awarded the English Literature Cup at our final ‘graduating’ assembly. Destiny set. I was going to be an author.
Turn the page to the next chapter – the scene is my first secondary school English lesson. I am having my tall poppy head sliced off. I have no memory of what was actually said: can’t even remember the teacher’s name, or what she looked like. I do remember the crushing reset. How foolish, to think I could be a writer! My efforts were lacking. I did not measure up. Just who did I think I was? She had pointed at the part of me that thought I couldn’t and said: “You’re right.”
It took me thirty years to get back to my dream.
It took me falling in love.
One day, my new husband asked: “Who do you think you are? Who do you really want to be?”
“An author, please?” I replied.
“Please?”
He frowned, then pointed at the part of me that thought I could, and said, “You’re right.”
That was ten years ago. Since then, I have written five full novel-scale manuscripts and have started my sixth. I self-published the first three and proved a boatload and more to myself. I could write books which did sell, and that people enjoyed reading. I decided to change genre and aim to be traditionally published – and this is the track I’m on today.
My fourth manuscript garnered one competition long-listing and sixty-three agent rejections. My fifth manuscript earned a long-listing in another competition and is currently collecting its own set of rejection-gongs. It hurts. It’s okay. It’s the process. I’m older. I know better now to keep going, and why it is important to do so: because my heart and its contents matter.
That moment of permission from my husband was my inciting incident – and the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme is perhaps my mid-point. Could this be the moment at which everything will change and there’ll be no going back? It’s a big investment in my dream of becoming the best novelist I am capable of being. I want to hone my craft and grab the opportunities the course provides. I want to be proud of my writing: confident that I’m on my way to being an accomplished – perhaps even a great – storyteller.
There are going to be a few more ups and downs in this plot line of mine. A crisis (or two) is to be expected. Moving between the first, second and third acts always involves some level of hanging off cliffs, yes?
Ultimately, I’m hoping this is a redemption story – that a happy ending looms in the future for me. If I end up attracting the attention of an agent or publisher – or if I don’t – I am giving myself permission to find out what I can achieve. I’m plotting and I’m planning. I’m defining character and honing my voice.
So, who do I think I am? I’m an author – learning to fully inhabit the role. Perhaps you’ll let me share my progress and experiences with you, as I work through the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme?
I hope so.
See you next time,
Rachel
Rachel Davidson is a long-term Premium Member of Jericho Writers prior to joining our Writer Support Team, Rachel loves helping hopeful writers, such as herself, to solve their problems and take a step or two closer to achieving their writing dreams. Rachel has previously self-published a trilogy, the first of which achieved bestseller status in fourteen Amazon categories in the UK, US, Australia and Canada and is now seeking her traditional publishing debut with her latest manuscript. You can find out more about Rachel via her Instagram @RachelDavidsonAuthor.
Do you struggle to silence the voice in your head that asks: 'Who are you to call yourself a writer?' or 'Who d'you think you are, spending precious time on a project that's bound to go nowhere?' You're far from alone. All authors - published and unpublished - struggle to shut this voice up from time to time. Rosie Fiore is an editor, mentor, the author of eight novels and a tutor on both our Novel Writing Course and Ultimate Novel Writing Programme. Here, she shares her top tips for banishing impostor syndrome for good...
How do you answer that dreaded question, “What do you do?”
“I’m an author.”
“I’m a writer.”
“I'm an aspiring writer.”
“I’m trying to write.”
“I write a bit in my spare time.”
It can be difficult to name ourselves as writers: to take pride in our work and our achievements and to keep our courage up. Writing is lonely and tough, and sometimes it’s hard to persuade yourself to keep going.
As a writer, I bear the scars of failure and indifference, and I’ve done my share of staring into the long dark night of the soul. I’ve also mentored hundreds of writers who face the fear every day. So, here are five things I tell them (and try to tell myself).
1. There is no magic threshold
What’s that insistent little voice in your head saying? Mine says things like: “Call yourself a writer? You haven’t published anything / finished anything / written anything good.”
When I started running, the same voice told me I couldn’t call myself a runner because I hadn’t run a marathon / half marathon / 10k, and I wasn’t very fast. I am here to tell you that this is nonsense, in both cases.
Of course I'm a runner, even though I am only running a slow few miles. And if you’re writing, you’re a writer.
You’re doing the work. It isn’t an exclusive club. You’re not aspiring, unpublished or trying. You’re a writer. Own it.
2. Get yourself some cheerleaders
Sometimes, your courage will fail you. You will look at the words on the page (or the lack thereof) and think that you can’t do this.
You will need someone else to tell you that you can. Maybe that will be your significant other / mum / child/ best friend. But if not, you need writing buddies - so find your people.
Join a writing group, in person or online. Do a course. Look on the Jericho Writers Townhouse. Other writers will cheer you on, and by supporting them in return you will learn and gain so much.
3. Back yourself
Oh, this one is difficult. I did a playwriting course once and the teacher, John Donnelly (a fantastic playwright), said these two words. “Back yourself.”
My mind instantly rebelled and that insistent little voice spoke up. “You’re rubbish,” it said. “Lazy, undisciplined, not very good. Why would anyone back you, least of all yourself?”
“How do you talk to yourself?” John asked, as if he could hear my inner voice. “Would you talk to anyone else like that? Don’t speak like that to the person you need most in the world.”
I have a tiny post-it by my desk now that says, “Back yourself.” And when the ugly voice surfaces, I try to remember to look at it.
4. Celebrate the small wins
Celebrate the big wins. Hell, celebrate ALL the wins.
You finished a draft? Take a walk in the park. You revised that tricky scene? Cup of tea and a biscuit. Someone asked for a full manuscript? Well, that’s worth a dinner with friends!
I have a special dance I perform every 10,000 words (my family loves it and doesn’t roll their eyes, honest!).
Don’t wait for some mythical future date when you achieve all your goals. Try to make every step of the process joyful.
5. Bum in chair, fingers on keyboard
If doubt creeps in, keep going. If you think it’s rubbish, keep going. If you want to scrap it all and give up, keep going.
Nothing silences that insistent, ugly inner voice like the clatter of typing.
And remember:
“People saying: “It can’t be done,” are always being interrupted by somebody doing it.” – Puck magazine, 1903.
You’ve probably heard the line “never let the truth get in the way of a good story.” You’ve probably also heard it attributed to the humourist Mark Twain – although, ironically enough, that attribution is doubtful at best.
But have you ever considered it as a piece of writing advice? It’s actually a tremendously helpful way of thinking about creative non-fiction and the way you have to wrestle reality onto the page.
Here are five useful lessons (perhaps we could even call them truisms!) that the famous phrase suggests:
1. Tell the truth
The truth isn’t the only thing that matters – and shortly, we’ll look more closely at why that’s the case. However, it’s still vitally important in non-fiction.
The best way to get readers to believe in you as a narrator is to make sure everything you say is credible. Check your facts. Verify your sources. Test your theories. Where you are doubtful, say so. Do not lie. Your book is pointless if it doesn’t feel trustworthy.
2. Remember: you are telling a story
Telling the truth doesn’t necessarily mean telling the whole truth. Your duty is to your reader – not to every single thing that happened.
Just because something has lodged in your memory, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s important. Always be thinking about what moves your writing forwards. What does your reader need to know to understand your narrative? What is less important?
Also, what’s interesting? Remember, stories are meant to be fun to read.
3. Remember that good dialogue on the page is not the same as real speech
Think about how journalists write up quotations. They don’t give us all the ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’, the hesitations and repetitions of natural speech – but we don’t (usually!) think that this is a deception.
It’s okay to make speech run more fluently and fluidly – as long as you stick to the essential meaning and import.
4. Real people have real feelings
These feelings can be hard to predict and easy to hurt. If you’re writing about real people, you have to be careful – both from the point of view of not getting sued, and in line with the demands of basic humanity.
Think carefully before you put anyone into your book. Are you sure you need to include them? Are you sure they will remember things in the same way you do? Are you certain your portrayal is accurate? Is there a justification for disguising someone’s identity?
5. The truth matters
I know I’ve already (kind of) said this, but it’s worth repeating. It’s worth stressing that the stories you tell as a non-fiction writer are worth telling, in spite of all the potential difficulties of doing so.
The truth counts. Today, yesterday, forever.
Setting it down on the page might just be the most important thing you do.
Julie Hartley, a Canada-based writer of historical fiction, shares her experience of writing for Bookouture.
When I submitted my first novel to Bookouture, a division of Hachette UK, I wasn't fully aware of the difference between digital-first and traditional publishers. I had published three books with independent presses, and I was seeking an agent in the hope that my next novel might find a more global readership. Then, I stumbled on the Bookouture website. I was delighted to see that you could submit to them unagented, and I sent off my manuscript at once.
From submission to publication
The novel I submitted to Bookouture was historical fiction set in occupied France in 1942, and I heard back from them within only a couple of weeks. The acquisitions editor felt the novel was not a fit for their lists, but on the strength of the manuscript she asked if I might be interested in writing something set in England during World War Two. Thrilled, I sent them several synopses, and they selected the two with the strongest hooks.
Publishing companies survive because they know how to sell books, and a strong hook is critical. My first novel for Bookouture, Her Secret Soldier, is about a lonely young woman who discovers an injured German spy in the ancient forest behind her home. She feels compelled to help him, but in doing so risks becoming a traitor to her country. My second novel, The Promise She Made, is about a feisty young girl in 1940 who, desperate to keep her younger sister safe from the Luftwaffe bombs, books passage for them both to Canada against the wishes of her family. Their ship is torpedoed by the Germans in the middle of the Atlantic, with heavy loss of life. A novel must have a strong hook for a publisher to sell it, and my experience with Bookouture taught me digital publishers are no exception.
After several emails and meetings, I received a contract to write both novels. I hadn’t thought such things still happened! However, a shock awaited me when I read the contract. The first novel was to be delivered in just three months.
Digital-first publishers are not a fit for every writer
Writers working with digital publishers often publish two or three books a year, building a brand and a following of loyal readers. Initially I found this pace daunting, but quickly discovered that I absolutely loved it. Writing to a tight deadline means beginning with a detailed plan, at least for me. I brushed up on five act structure and expanded the first synopsis into acts, then chapters, and finally scenes before beginning the first draft.
Every morning for eight weeks I wrote from 5am to 9am and, despite working full time, finished the novel with a week to spare. Meeting a tight deadline meant changing how I worked in other ways, too. My first draft is always handwritten, but there wasn’t time to type in the second draft as I might usually have done, so I tried talk to text. To my surprise, this had a positive impact on my manuscript, since the musicality of a sentence is much more apparent when it is read out loud.
Tight deadlines wouldn’t work for all writers, but I discovered that immersion in the lives of my characters day after day was something I really enjoyed – along with the knowledge that, for the first time, I was writing something that would definitely be published.
A good editor can make or break an experience with a publisher, digital or otherwise
I'm fortunate enough to have a fabulous editor at Bookouture. She is quick to spot structural issues in a manuscript, which is what you need when the deadline is tight – but she is also kind, and she sees the editorial process as a dialogue. I had initially wondered if the tight publication schedule of a digital-first publisher might mean hasty editing, but this was not the case. My experience with Bookouture has been nothing but positive.
The pros and cons of working with a digital-first publisher
With a traditional publisher it can take years to grow your novel from hook to book, but with a digital publisher the journey is much quicker. In addition, many digital publishers accept submissions from unagented writers. These were both huge positives for me. On the flip side, working with a digital publisher means you don’t see your books in shops, at least initially – something that might be an important consideration for some writers.
It's difficult to say what the future of digital-first publishing will be in an industry that is ever-changing, but for now at least, digital publishers offer writers an additional route to publication – and at a time when it can seem harder than ever before to succeed creatively, this is surely a good thing.
Julie Hartley is the author of two historical novels, both released by Bookouture. She lives in Toronto, Canada where she runs creative writing classes for teens and retreats for adults. You can find Julie's latest novel here. You can also find out more about Julie and her books on her website, and stay up to date with her latest releases via Facebook and Instagram.
Rory Marsden is the self-published author of six books – the first in his series of historical fantasies, Tales of Castle Rory. We caught up with him to ask how he got started with self-publishing, and what he’s learned about the process.
Jericho Writers: Hi Rory, thanks so much for taking part in this Q&A with us! We know lots of people in our community are intrigued by the idea of self-publishing – but many don’t feel confident about trying it. How did you get started?
Rory Marsden: I learnt what to do by taking the amazing Simply Self-Publish course. My tutor was Debbie Young, and the course was invaluable – and not only because of the information it provided and the feedback I received on my assignments. Just as important were Debbie’s gentle encouragement, and her willingness to answer all questions. It was Debbie and her course that gave me the confidence to tackle the whole business, after which I found it isn’t as hard as you think. The course got me started, and now I’m on my own unique journey.
JW: We know lots of people worry that self-publishing means doing absolutely everything yourself. Was that the case for you?
RM: No! First, my books have all been professionally proofread, and they all have professional cover designs. These are important investments; expensive but worth it. For Books one and two, I also paid for professionally formatted interiors, but after that I bought Vellum, a brilliant piece of software, and I’ve formatted all the other books myself. I feel very confident with this now – but of course, it might not be for everyone.
This logic applied to the whole process of self-publishing: at all stages you can choose how much to do yourself and how much to farm out to professionals. The more you do yourself, the less you have to pay, and you really do learn as you go along. If you’re nervous, you can pay other people, and you’ll still retain all your rights.
JW: Are there any things you’d never consider doing yourself?
RM: For me, it’s cover design. A DIY approach for this is a false economy and will come back to bite you. Amateur covers are too obviously just that, though of course if you have graphic design experience you might get away with it! Professional editing or proof-reading is equally essential.
JW: So - once you had your book ready, what was your next step?
RM: I opted to publish through KDP Select, meaning the ebook couldn’t be sold anywhere but on Amazon. However, the paperback can be sold anywhere at all, so I used Draft2Digital, an aggregator that handles making your paperback available from different online retailers.
Being in KDP Select means your books are available to anyone who has signed up for Kindle Unlimited. They can “borrow” your book and read it on their device, and you get royalties for every page they read. I’ve found this works well for my books.
You can get a KDP account set up way in advance of publishing, and then it will be there, ready for you, when you’re poised to publish. I’d advise doing this as soon as you’ve made the decision to self-publish – it’s one less thing to think about further down the line.
JW: What can you tell us about the nitty-gritty of self-publishing – the finer details you’ve had to get to grips with?
RM: I’ve learned an awful lot about how Amazon works! The platform needs to know what it’s selling and who’s likely to buy it. It asks you to select the categories your book fits into, and the keywords customers might put into a search tool when they are looking for books to read. You need to choose these with care, and there’s a limit to how many you can put in. There’s a short cut to researching dozens of similar books, though, and that’s to buy an app called Publisher Rocket. You have to pay for it, so more money going out before anything comes in, but it really does solve the Category and Keyword issue very quickly.
JW: You seem to have picked up a lot of knowledge since starting your self-publishing journey. Have some lessons been harder to learn than others?
RM: Yes! Getting your book up online and available to purchase is only the start, as I have discovered. You see, nobody knows about your book. So, nobody buys it! Amazon gives you thirty days to do something about this. In those thirty days, the Amazon algorithms are working in your favour, pushing your book at anyone who might (in the algorithms’ opinion) be interested. The algorithms work from the categories you’ve selected, and this is why it’s so important to get them right.
After thirty days, if your book isn’t selling, Amazon doesn’t care anymore, and the book is no longer pushed. It’s still available, just not very visible. That’s what happened to me. I had to look into marketing, something I’d never done before.
JW: What happened next?
RM: I was told, by various experts, that most self-published authors are not interested in marketing. They shy away from it, wanting to spend their time writing their books instead. However, self-publishing means understanding that your book is a product. It needs to be marketed efficiently and effectively. You, the author, need to be marketed too. You need a brand, an identity people can connect with, and a story that will resonate. Not the story in your shiny new novel, but the story of you.
I needed help with this and paid for time with a marketing advisor – but if you’ve worked in this sort of field before, you can probably save a lot of money!
JW: In your view, what are the main advantages of self-publishing?
RM: As an independent author, you retain all rights and all control over your manuscript and everything that happens to it. Traditional publishers often offer contracts in which you relinquish rights such as translation into other languages, new editions, new formats, which books might come next in a series, cover design and much else. With self-publishing/independent publishing, it’s all in your control. So, you do all the hard work – but you also get to say what happens, and your royalties per book sale are much greater.
JW: What do you think is the most important self-publishing advice you could share with our community?
RM: Probably that the publishing part of self-publishing – uploading your files to Amazon, for example – is the easy bit! Everything that comes with it is fun, but you need to enjoy the challenges of marketing, branding, selling and so on. I made some bad decisions early on. For example, before I hired my marketing advisor, I spent money on Amazon ads without knowing what I was doing. Most of my other decisions were good ones, thankfully.
You will need to invest in self-publishing – and that’s how to think about it. I considered joining the Simply Self-Publish course the first step on that road, and I’m really glad I took it. I wish anyone else thinking of taking the plunge the very best of luck!
About Rory Marsden
Rory Marsden is the author of a series of Medieval fantasy adventures, the Tales of Castle Rory. You can visit his website at: talesofcastlerory.co.uk and buy his books here.
As a writer of romantic novels, one of my top priorities is making sure sparks fly between my protagonists. My readers expect sizzling chemistry that slow-burns into a satisfying happy ever after – but readers of all genres want to meet people whose relationships they can invest in.
Whatever genre you’re writing in, creating chemistry between your characters is crucial. Whether you’re working on a dystopian horror novel, a sweeping fantasy trilogy or a gritty crime thriller, it should be as high up your authorial to-do list as mine.
So, what is chemistry?
This is a good question. Often, chemistry is one of those ‘you know it when you see it’ things.
Consider Sherlock Holmes and Moriarty, or Harry, Ron and Hermione. Think of the push and pull between the very different Dashwood sisters in Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility, or the relentless bickering of the many Bridgerton siblings.
To me, chemistry is the force that animates fictional relationships, taking them from flat to 3D. It’s what makes them feel real and believable, but also what makes them entertaining.
Establishing effective chemistry really means creating connection between your characters. Often, this link involves recognition and / or resistance. Perhaps the characters see things in one another that they love or hate – or maybe they perceive pieces of themselves in the other person. This might be joyous or deeply disturbing.
In any case, the most important thing to remember is that chemistry is founded on feelings. It requires characters to provoke strong reactions in one another, whether positive or negative.
Tried and tested methods for creating chemistry
1. Equal or opposite responses to events. Whatever type of relationship you’re building between characters, putting them in a tricky situation can pay dividends. Will their problem pull them together? Will it expose the differences between them? If so, good – because conflict is excellent fuel for chemistry.
On the other hand, perhaps getting out of their pickle will force your characters into a rapprochement that brings them closer. It could help them recognise qualities in one another that they hadn’t known were there.
Throw your characters into the deep end to test a long-standing relationship or show the formation of a new one. Whether they sink, swim or struggle awkwardly to the side of the pool will help your reader understand who these people are – but also who they are to one another.
2. Physical touch. In romance novels, physical touch is key to creating chemistry. However, the same logic applies to any genre of novel where there’s a romantic sub-plot. Robert Galbraith’s Strike series is an obvious example.
Touch doesn’t have to be overtly sexual or gratuitous – it can be a fleeting brush of fingertips or a comforting hug that lasts just a moment too long. The point is for it to evoke emotions that go beyond platonic boundaries.
Between friends, touch can be grounding: a signal that your character isn’t alone in facing whatever challenge is before them. Touch can also denote a shift in a relationship, from friendship to more or from casual to committed. Never underestimate the significance of one character taking another by the hand.
3. Little (and large) intimacies. Think in-jokes, nicknames or one character knowing another’s coffee order by heart. All signal connections that can be romantic but don’t have to be.
In my current work-in-progress, the first thing my protagonist’s best friend – a chef – says to her in chapter one is: ‘Hungry? I’ve saved you a plate with all the good stuff.’ It’s easy, effective shorthand for: ‘I know you and I care about you.’
Elsewhere, the delivery of tough love – or the prodding of old wounds – can signal and strengthen characters’ chemistry. When one person knows about another’s painful past or calls them out on their BS, the bond between them becomes clear and feels real.
4.Heightened awareness. In the same spirit as my character’s bestie recognising the rumbling of her stomach, showing that one person has heightened awareness of another is an easy way to...
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4.Heightened awareness. In the same spirit as my character’s bestie recognising the rumbling of her stomach, showing that one person has heightened awareness of another is an easy way to establish chemistry between them.
This can be as simple as your protagonist always knowing when or where someone else is in a room – zooming in on their presence out of attraction or concern. Alternatively, the awareness might go deeper. Perhaps they alone understand that their friend or lover’s smile masks discomfort – or that what they’re saying doesn’t match how they really feel inside.
There might also be a physical or sensory dimension to heightened awareness: familiarity with the sound of someone’s voice or laugh, for example, or a liking for the homely scent of their washing powder.
5. A moment of high emotion. This is another method that’s used to great effect in deepening romantic chemistry – but it’s handy elsewhere, too!
In a romance, we might see one character become unexpectedly defensive or protective of another. It’s a revealing moment that shows they care – perhaps more, or in a different way, than has previously been suspected.
However, you can also show the depth of a friendship through this device – and it can be equally emotional for your readers. Towards the end of my first novel, the protagonist reveals her most closely guarded secret to a colleague she’s held at arm’s length throughout the story. His kindness helps her realise that she’s under-valued his support all along, solidifying its importance in advance of the book’s finale.
The chemistry test
Not sure whether your characters have sufficient chemistry? The quickest way to check is to trap them in a confined space.
Imagine they’re stuck in a lift. If neither of them cares – if the other’s presence doesn’t make them uncomfortable, nervous, soothed or excited – then you have a problem. Indifference is the antithesis of chemistry, and it’s this you need to tackle.
In which case, refer to the ideas above. Consider them the Mentos you might (in a controlled and entirely safe way) drop into the Coke can that is your story.
As always, good luck, and happy writing!
Check out Laura Starkey's latest romcom, Love Off Script, which was released on 11 March 2025 and is published by Embla Books.
An article in The Bookseller recently argued that we’re now in a “golden age” of self-publishing – and if you’re currently debating the best way to get your novel into readers’ hands, taking the ‘DIY’ approach has almost certainly crossed your mind.
Self-publishing is rewarding in a wide variety of ways if you can do it successfully – not least because you’re likely to make much more money per book sale than if you published traditionally.
It’s also worth noting that self-publishing no longer places you and your work beyond the purview of traditional houses. Far from it. Many successful self-publishers are now taking a ‘hybrid’ approach to putting their work out there – in some cases selling audio or foreign rights to their books while retaining self-pub rights elsewhere. There’s also what The Bookseller describes as ‘a pipeline’ developing, with self-pubbed authors using their previous success as incredible leverage when negotiating trad deals.
With self-publishing in the spotlight, and as we approach the deadline for applications to our Simply Self-Publishing course, we asked tutor and indie publishing expert Debbie Young to answer some of the burning questions you might have about how it really works…
Jericho Writers: One fear we know people have – despite the changing landscape – is that self-publishing is for authors who simply aren’t good enough to get traditional deals. What do you say to that?
Debbie Young: Self-publishing is not the home of second-rate writers! There are a lot of authors now self-publishing by choice, for the autonomy, for the control, and because they don't want to compromise their vision to fit whatever narrow mould traditional publishers are pursuing.
JW: What about the idea that self-publishing a novel is essentially a vanity project?
DY: Forget the word vanity – when you self-publish seriously, you are not pursuing a vanity project. This isn’t just about printing a book or getting an ebook up onto Amazon so you can say it exists. You are – or should be – publishing a high-quality book because it will appeal to a real market. Your intention should be to reach that market and achieve sales. Basically, if you’re doing it just to see your name ‘in print’, you’re doing it wrong – and you’re almost certainly not making the most of it.
JW: It sounds as though your best chance of success as a self-publisher is to be quite businesslike – to see it as something entrepreneurial.
DY: Exactly. But that doesn’t mean you have to do absolutely everything yourself. You’re not going to have to learn to design covers, format ebooks or print books, or edit or proofread. Instead, self-publishing means taking the same responsibility as a publisher would in a commercial firm – and assembling a team of experts to get your book off the blocks. They can provide any special skills that you don’t have, under your management and direction.
JW: One thing we know people worry about is approaching the ebook market – especially if they are not Kindle or ebook readers themselves.
DY: This comes back to being businesslike. Sell ebooks, even if you don’t read them yourself! Self-pubbed authors typically make around 95% of their money from ebooks, so it’s not a market you can afford to ignore. This is a good example of how a course like Simply Self-Publish can make all the difference to people embarking on this journey: it’s going to expose your blind spots, help you avoid mistakes and arm you with the knowledge you need to move forward successfully.
JW: And what about Kindle Unlimited? People are confused by that, too – particularly how (and even if!) authors get paid when their books are included.
DY: You do get paid as a self-published author when your books are in Kindle Unlimited, or KU. You must agree to exclusivity with Amazon, but you’ll earn ‘page reads’ income for every page of your prose that’s consumed by a KU reader. KU is a really important platform to understand properly as a self-publisher, so we cover it in some detail on the Simply Self-Publish course.
JW: And how does print-on-demand (POD) work? This is another key question we know would-be self-publishers are keen to have answered…
DY: It’s a good, and important, question! POD is the lowest-cost method for printing books, and POD printing though a service like Kindle Direct Publishing or IngramSpark allows just-in-time ordering. This means there’s no upfront cost and no need to hold hundreds of copies of your book in your spare room or a pricey warehouse. Thanks to POD, you can now publish a book with a print-run as low as one. Again, we go into detail about POD on the Simply Self-Publish course.
JW: This final question is probably the biggest one: how do you know if self-publishing is right for you?
DY: I think it’s about being honest with yourself, in terms of your goals and ambitions, the level of control you want to have over your own work, and how much you’re prepared to put into the process. I’d never tell anyone self-publishing is easy, but for many authors it is now their preferred option. And to some degree, it’s about what you’re writing, too: self-publishing works especially well for writers of genre fiction, for books that form part of a series, and so on – but less well for children’s and academic books, which are still mostly consumed in print.
JW: Do you have any final advice?
DY: Learn as much as you can before getting started. Think about doing a course like Simply Self-Publish and consider it an upfront investment in the business of becoming an author. Through Simply Self-Publish, my students create actionable strategies and marketing plans for their books – and that’s exactly what you need to organise upfront, before you even consider putting your book up for sale. Approach it in the right way, and self-publishing can be the starting point for a super fulfilling writing career. I wish you all the best!
Self-publishing expert Debbie Young is the author of thirteen novels, two of which have been shortlisted for the prestigious BookBrunch Selfies Award for best independently-published adult fiction in the UK. She now combines licensing selective rights for her books to various publishers including Boldwood Books, DP Verlag, and Saga Egmont, while continuing to self-publish. Debbie has seven years’ experience as Commissioning Editor of the Alliance of Independent Authors’ daily self-publishing advice blog. She is also an Ambassador for ALLi and has written several advice books and pamphlets for indie authors.
A renowned champion of indie authors everywhere, Debbie now shares her passion for self-publishing and her enjoyment in supporting and nurturing other authors as a mentor and course tutor for Jericho Writers.
We're delighted to share that the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme alumna S.J. King's debut novel, Where You Belong, has been published this week by Storm Publishing. We caught up with S.J. to chat about her writing journey, the support she found most valuable along the way and her plans for the future.
JW: Hi S.J, thank you so much for chatting to us about your writing journey. You have not one, but two books coming out in 2025 with Storm Publishing - congratulations! How are you feeling in the run up to becoming a published author?
S.J: Thanks so much to Jericho Writers for being a big part of my story these last few years.
So how am I feeling...? Firstly, excited and still surprised. After years of writing, editing, pitching, re-editing, agenting, un-agenting, being on submission, being rejected and then writing, reading, submitting and editing more... I am thrilled that this has ‘suddenly’ happened. I still can’t quite believe it.
Secondly, it’s a lot of firsts! It's my first time to get a book deal (for starters), but also first time to get a structural edits letter from my editor, select a voice actor for the audiobook, to get an amazing cover and have a cover reveal, to receive ARC reviews and have people tag me on Instagram. Another day, another first! I feel young again.
JW: Let’s start at the beginning. Can you tell us a little bit about your journey to becoming a published author?
S.J: I think it is clear I am not an overnight success! But I almost was… my first agent was an incredible top-level agent who called me within fifteen mins of my first submission. Yep, that happened.
She sent my book to London Book Fair the following week, said she hoped it would go to auction. Nope. All the big publishers liked it, but not enough. Seeing all her other books sell for six and seven figures over the years, and her authors going on to become bestsellers, has been exciting to watch - but a little sad, as I thought my ship had sailed.
But as a writer, resilience and persistence are absolutely key. I put myself back on the horse (a horse on a ship?) and wrote more books, got another agent, went out on submission again and experienced more rejection. Just as I was on the point of giving up, I came upon the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme (UNWP). In the year after the programme, I landed a two-book deal.
My second book, Lauren is Missing, is the book I was originally agented for, and the one my publisher (Storm) first read - but is not my debut. I have two more books in the bag, one of which I wrote on the UNWP with the fabulous Emma Cooper as my mentor. Working on this helped me go back to the others with a better skillset.
JW: After having spent a long time writing and re-writing the same story, spending infinite amounts of time with your characters – how did you know it was time to send it out into the world?
S.J: You don’t.
Lauren is Missing has probably been rewritten a hundred times. I have so many files and versions. I have butchered it to the point where I was word blind. Where I loved it and also didn’t think I could read it again. Then, after UNWP and all that I learnt, I picked it up and edited it with fresh eyes, adding a whole new POV. Bingo, book deal. (Of course, I have had to edit it again, but I am now finally on the home straight.)
Make sure you love your work, but not so much that you’re stubborn. Use all the support available (such as reviews and the video courses that Jericho Writers offer as part of their Premium Membership), then send to a few agents or consider a one-to-one. Test and try. Rejected? Keep going. Write a new book. You learn something from each one, and you widen your chances.
Also, read. Read books in your genre that have what it takes. Then reread your book. Does it hold up? Do you get tangled in parts? If so, take them out.
JW: Have you got any tips for writers who are preparing their novels for submission?
S.J: RESILIENCE. Believe in yourself (without arrogance.) Be willing to take the hits, the rejections, but not personally (easier said than done). Don’t refresh your mailbox every three seconds. (Easier said than done.) Accept that most authors don’t get a deal with their first book, and many authors don’t make it big with their first even if they are published. Stay in love with writing, not just one book. Have a strong pitch, and remember it doesn’t have to be entirely unique. In fact, comparisons are your friend. A lot of reviewers have said they didn’t quite know what to make of Where You Belong because it is not what they expected. It's a psychological thriller with a thread of dystopia.
JW: Can you tell us a little bit about the process your book has gone through, post-book deal, in preparation for publication? How have you found the experience of working with an editor?
S.J: Joyful.
I guess because I had done rewrites for agents and myself, dismembering my books, knowing that these are the final rounds of edits has felt fabulous.
Vicky, my editor, is just so calm, encouraging, supportive and committed. It feels that with Storm I have a team of caring professionals all around me. I focus on being a writer and they have everything else in the bag. They know their stuff and are very author-friendly.
JW: Before you signed with Storm Publishing, you completed the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme. Can you tell us a little about that experience?
SJ: Oh, so good.
I learned so much that I can keep mining for improvement. Just after I joined I was asked to step into my manager’s role. So I had two jobs and was on this course. (Plus kids, husband, cat on prozac... all the rest.) I thought I would have to stop the course. But my mentor, Emma, was brilliant, the course was flexible, my group were supportive and understanding. Somehow it all fitted and the course was so interesting that I made time for it and the assignments, and the assignments added up to a finished novel. Plus you can work on the content wherever you are in the world, or to suit your work/life schedule. Even the team sessions are recorded so you can watch what you miss.
Each month felt like an unboxing of writing gifts. I just wanted it to go on forever. When it finished, I really missed it for months afterwards.
JW: In all the time you spent developing your craft, both on and off the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme, is there anything you found particularly useful?
S.J: The friendship of fellow writers. I can honestly say I have made lifelong friends through writing. That it feels like the escapist, introvert, and sometimes sanity-sucking world of writing needs other writers to understand the obsession, the process, the highs and lows.
You need people to empathise and share with you, and critique your work - but also to put you back into the game when you are ready to give up. I love other writers, and hope I can give back more than I ever take. I think writers are truly the most generous givers of encouragement and knowledge. If you have questions you'd like to ask, I will share…
JW: Have there been any surprises along the way? Or perhaps anything you wished you had known earlier?
You can be a plotter AND a pantser. I create an outline and then suddenly… wow… who is Josh? Where did he come from? Oh, OK Josh wants to be a main character does he… wait, why did he do that…?
Don’t keep editing the first chapter. You can write a book for five years and still only be doing that. You’ll have some VERY overwritten first chapters that are probably worse than when you started. Write forward…
It is a lot about luck, BUT you can make your own luck if you are resilient and don’t only nurse one project. Diversify and try to be a bit more prolific.
Straddling genres or ‘challenging genre norms’ is not as appreciated as you think. Most readers like things to match their expectations. A domestic psychological thriller with dystopian hints… never! Believe me, my reviewers all comment on it.
Celebrate all milestones. A new book idea, a finished draft, an edit, a positive review, non-form feedback from an agent. Whatever it is, feel FABULOUS. I don’t do enough of that, I’m a bit ‘well, let’s wait and see, it’s just a step.’ Fortunately my husband is my biggest fan and wants to celebrate everything.
Help your family/children/friends to understand what this means to you. My kids have grown up with my writing and my daughter is now the absolute best advisor on my work. She is blunt and nearly always right.
JW: Can you let us know what are you working on now?
S.J: A bit of social media for my book launch (not needed, but quite fun). Editing book two – Lauren is Missing - out in July 2025. The last 25,000 words of a next book. And a new idea just burst into my brain, so I'm trying not to get too tempted or to lose it before I can get to it. (Oh, and my job…)
JW: We love asking our writers for one piece of advice they wish they knew at the beginning of their journey. If you could go back, is there anything you would tell your past self?
S.J: It probably won’t happen when you think it will. But don’t give up, it will happen.
(Oh, sorry… a second thing: Jericho Writers is amazing. I truly mean that. I could write a book about all the support I have received over the years.)
(Oh… last one, I promise: writing is an amazing escape and meditation from the world when it's a little crazy, so be grateful that you were given the key to this little special room inside your head. Not everybody gets that…)
Want to follow in S.J. King's footsteps? You can learn more about the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme and how it can help you write a publishable novel in a year!
About S.J. King
S.J. King is the writer of dark, literary psychological thrillers, and fun lover. She will publish two books with Storm in 2025.
For more on S.J. King see her TikTok, Twitter/X, Instagram, and Facebook. Feel free to ask her questions if you have them. She’s been in the trenches for a while…
Over the past month, the Jericho Writers team has been tightly focused on helping you to write better scenes.
Through the Write With Jericho video course – free for Premium Members – we’ve explored:
Making each scene purposeful
Creating atmosphere in your scene
Dynamic dialogue and internal monologue
Show, don’t tell - and when to break the rule.
Many of you have shared examples of your work with us during the course, and our four tutors fed back on the writing they saw via the forums over on Townhouse.
Here, I’ll share some of the most common challenges authors experienced as they worked on perfecting their scenes – as well as our top tips for overcoming them.
Making each scene purposeful
Following lesson one, best-selling author Becca Day had the following advice to share with her fellow writers:
Remember the purpose of your B plot: This seemed to be a sticking point for some authors, but – in a nutshell – the B plot sums up the reason why the A plot is your character’s story to tell. What is it that makes this tale, and this scene within it, so personal to your protagonist?
Make sure the stakes are personal: Even if you think you’ve come up with something suitably emotive, Becca suggests digging a little deeper to see if you can make it more so. Instead of ‘My character will lose her job if XYZ,’ consider: ‘If XYZ, my character will lose her job – and it’s the job her father always wanted for her. She’ll be letting down his memory if she’s sacked.’ This calls into question whether the character actually cares about her job as much as her father did, or if she’s merely doing it because she feels like she owes it to him. See how much more powerful that just became?
Creating atmosphere in your scene
Meanwhile, Jericho Writers founder Harry Bingham shared these thoughts after teaching Write With Jericho lesson two:
Consider what to leave out, as well as what to put in: Repeated words and phrases, or detail where it isn’t necessary, can detract from the atmosphere you’re working so hard to create. It might sound contrary, but keeping your writing spare – choosing your words carefully – is a terrific technique for building atmosphere.
Be mindful of pace: On the flip side, make sure you’re not hurrying past moments where the reader might like to linger. As you’re describing a setting, ask yourself – does this need a reaction shot? Do I need to dwell, just for a moment, on the feeling this elicits in the character(s)?
If you create a moment, let it live: To some extent, this is about pace, too – but also the natural ways people react to things. When you introduce some action into your setting – a loud noise, say – make sure your character(s) respond to this in a way, and in an order, that feels believable. They won’t know what the sound is, so let’s see their experience of it, their shock and confusion, and then perhaps their relief at figuring out the reason for the din. Don’t name the noise or its source until your character(s) could reasonably know what it is and where it’s coming from or the moment will lose its authenticity.
Dynamic dialogue and internal monologue
In the lesson three forum, I shared the following feedback with our authors:
Avoid excessive formality: In my Write With Jericho lesson, I talked about the importance of keeping speech natural and appropriate for your characters and setting. This advice applies to internal monologue, too. If you want readers to feel close to your protagonist or narrator, you must make them feel like a friend. That means using contractions (‘won’t’ instead of ‘will not’ / ‘don’t’ instead of ‘do not’), and avoiding the sort of stiffness that might feel more ‘job interview’ than ‘intimate, honest conversation’.
Keep an eye on your POV: All writers are guilty of letting their point of view wander from time to time – but it’s important not to let it amble too far! If you’re working in first person or third person close, you need to be vigilant and stay mindful of what your main character can reasonably know about others’ thoughts, feelings and motivations. Be careful not to stray too far into omniscience, if this isn’t the mode you’re actually working in.
Watch out for clunky self-referencing: This is a pet peeve of mine, but in first person narratives (where protagonists are forced to think and talk about themselves constantly), I think it’s important to keep self-references natural. Does anyone really think about the colour of their own hair as they shove it out of their face? Or the precise shade of their eyes as they close them in despair? Obviously, your readers want this information – they need to know what your protagonist looks like – but real internal monologues simply don’t work like this. You need a reason for your character to be thinking about whatever they’re contemplating, so find one! Or, save the eye colour info for a moment where it will slot in seamlessly.
Remember, punctuation affects pace: The way you punctuate speech can have a huge impact on how it sounds – and whether it lands with a big bang or a whimper. If in doubt, read it aloud (even if your nearest and dearest will fear you’ve lost the plot). Consider the difference between: ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean that,’ and ‘Sorry. Really. I didn’t mean that.’
Show, don't tell - and when to break the rule
Finally, over on the lesson four feedback forum, Sophie Flynn suggested the following fixes for writers trying to strike the right balance between showing and telling.
Beware of filtering: Words like ‘seemed’, ‘appeared’, ‘noticed’ and ‘felt’ can signal you’re a step too far away from your main character’s point of view – that you’re filtering their experience through a second pair of eyes. Minimise this if you can, and you’ll find your writing feels sharper and more immediate.
Watch out for showing that feels like telling: Running a fingertip over a barely healed wound, for example, is an act that needs to be connected to a thought or conversation that’s happening in the moment. Otherwise, it won’t feel natural.
Don’t show where telling would be clearer: Again, this is a question of getting the balance right – but if trying to show something takes longer, is more effortful and is potentially confusing for the reader, don’t be afraid just to state a few simple facts.
Ready to dive in...?
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If you’re anything like me, writing the opening pages of a novel is one of the best, most magical parts of the entire drafting process. Everything is new and interesting! The idea is still shiny, still full of potential! The words practically pour onto the page.
Then — quite rudely, and without any warning — the words only drip. A few sentences here, a single paragraph there, until your brain feels clogged, the ideas stopped up.
While it’s common to hit a creative block or two (…hundred) as you’re drafting your novel, there are three techniques I always recommend to writers for pushing through those barriers and consistently getting words on the page.
1. Set a goal for yourself every time you sit down to write — and keep it reasonable.
Your goal will be dictated by what makes the most sense to your process. Perhaps that’s a word-count goal, or a page-count goal, or a certain number of scenes you want to write that day. Whatever it is, be sure to keep it reasonable, i.e. keep it small.
You might think setting a small goal for yourself is a counterproductive way of making good progress on your draft, but I’ve found that small goals actually take the pressure off. There’s a huge difference for me, mentally, at the beginning of a writing session when I have a goal of five hundred words versus one or two thousand. When it’s only five hundred, I feel like I have a chance! After all, five hundred is only one hundred words five times, and I can definitely write a hundred words.
The best part is: once you hit your reasonable goal (which you will; I believe in you), you get to feel like an absolute rockstar for accomplishing exactly what you set out to do, and I find that when I have that feeling, the words keep coming! And if they don’t, that’s okay, because you still accomplished your goal and still made progress.
2. Give yourself “short assignments”
This technique comes from Anne Lamott in her excellent craft text, Bird by Bird. She notes how easy it is to become overwhelmed by the huge scope of writing a novel, so she recommends breaking it down into much smaller chunks, i.e. short assignments.
Examples of short assignments might be writing the first paragraph of a chapter, writing just the dialogue in a scene, or finding the right transition between one section and the next.
Once you finish one assignment, you can take a break (or, my favourite, reward yourself with chocolate) and then dive into another.
3. Write to a word
If you’re stuck on what kind of short assignments to give yourself, here’s one I love to do...
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3. Write to a word
If you’re stuck on what kind of short assignments to give yourself, here’s one I love to do. Pick up a book — any book — and open it to a random page. Without looking, put your finger down on a word (repeat if you land on something like “a” or “this”; those won’t help you here).
Once you have your word, your job is to write until you can incorporate that word into your draft in a sensible way. For example, if you landed on the word “thunder,” you might have a character’s voice thunder across the room. Or maybe there’s a clap of thunder outside that startles a couple during a fight. Or maybe someone’s footsteps thunder from the apartment above, making your protagonist anxious. Once you’ve incorporated your word, you can repeat this process as many times as you want, giving yourself a new word to write toward each time.
I’m sure by now you’ve noticed there’s a pattern in these three tips, and that’s because, for me, making progress is all about keeping things as manageable for yourself as possible. While you may feel from one day to the next that you’re only making a tiny dent in your novel, it’s important to remember that a lot of small progress added together is actually big progress.
Pardon the cliché, but writing a novel truly is a marathon, not a sprint, and you get to the end one step at a time.
Dialogue is one of the cornerstones of great fiction writing. Whatever genre you’re working in, and whether your novel is literary or commercial, your characters need to speak to one another.
Why? First, because talking is just what people do. A book where the characters didn’t have conversations would feel totally unrealistic, not to mention decidedly odd.
Just as importantly, dialogue provides blessed relief from long stretches of narrative description. While these are crucial for establishing context, worldbuilding and setting readers’ expectations, they simply aren’t sustainable over 300 pages. Dialogue is immediate and immersive: it lifts the tone of a scene and quickens its pace, providing vital balance. I think of it as a load-bearing wall: something that keeps the shape of your story sound, and its structure strong. Without it, your novel could sink beneath the weight of too much ‘telling’.
This leads me on to another reason why dialogue is so very useful for us authors. It allows us to show, clearly and effectively, all sort of things that might be tiresome to describe. Want to make clear that one character has history with another? Give them an opportunity to bicker about something that happened years ago. Need to signal that someone in your novel is more educated than they claim? Give them a short speech where jargon they’ve no business knowing creeps in.
In my Write With Jericho lesson, I go deep into the theory and practice of writing great dialogue – and I also explain how internal monologue can intersect with what your characters say out loud. Here, I’m going to share a few dos and don’ts that should help you while you craft or edit your characters’ dialogue. I hope you find them useful.
Do give your characters distinct voices.
Think about accents, dialect and vocabulary. A wealthy, Oxbridge-educated lawyer will likely sound different from someone who’s grown up in poverty, left school at sixteen and has spent time in prison – and please note, that remains true even if the characters are of equal intelligence!
What can the way your character speaks tell us about their background, upbringing, education and social status? Does their voice truly reflect who they are inside? If not, why not? (I’m looking at you, Charlotte from The Traitors…)
Do make characters' speech appropriate for the situation.
We all modify the way we speak, depending on who we’re speaking to; we chat with friends and family in a very different way than we’d talk to a job interview panel! While your character’s dialogue needs to stay consistent with who they are, you also need to allow for subtle shifts in how they speak.
Do remember that most speech is informal.
Unless you’re writing dialogue for a novel set in another world or time period, I’d always recommend using contractions and keeping your characters’ speech casual. In real life, we usually say ‘I can’t’, or ‘I don’t’, not ‘I cannot’ or ‘I do not’. Informality is key for making your characters’ speech believable. It ensures their conversations feel overheard, rather than artificial.
Don't allow your characters to speak in soliloquy or conduct Q&As.
Unless you’ve created a Winston Churchill-style character, it will feel unnatural for them to make long, uninterrupted speeches. Likewise, most conversations involve meandering and obfuscation – especially if one person is trying to extract information that another isn’t keen to share. Very rarely do any of us give a straight answer when we’re asked a point-blank question, so bear this in mind as you write.
Do make your dialogue work hard.
We’ve all heard the advice to strip adverbs out of our work and use simple dialogue tags – and I’m not the woman to gainsay it. Broadly speaking, if you’re choosing the words your characters speak carefully enough, they can do an awful lot of heavy lifting for you. Want to imply your character is shouting? Show their growing exasperation through the words inside the speech marks. Want to make it clear they’re grief-stricken? Use words that show this, so you don’t need to tell readers how they feel.
Don't overuse exclamation marks and italics.
This is an especially useful tip for when you’re editing dialogue: if it’s riddled with exclamations and italics, you probably need to tighten it up. Too much shouty, slanty content is a sign your dialogue isn’t strong enough, or that you didn’t have full confidence in it as you were drafting. Review it and see what could change.
Finally, don't worry that everything your characters say needs to match up perfectly with what's going on inside.
In fact, it’s thrilling for a reader when a character’s internal monologue contradicts what they’re doing and saying. This dichotomy is often key for developing a strong connection between your reader and your story’s protagonist – so exploit it if you can. Show them that your character’s outward loathing of their workplace rival hides a powerful, secret crush; signal that the perfect wife’s devotion to her husband is the smokescreen for her dastardly murder plot.
Embarking on the journey to write a novel is both thrilling and intimidating. For me, the decision to pursue writing courses through Jericho Writers was about more than just learning to write — it was about growth, connection, and finding my voice in the literary world.
Here’s how these courses shaped my writing journey and why they might be the stepping stone you need, too.
Why I chose writing courses with Jericho Writers
Writing a novel has always been my dream, but like many aspiring authors, I felt unsure of where to start. I sought professional guidance to refine my writing and push my creative boundaries. I wanted to gain technical skills, build confidence, and surround myself with a community of like-minded storytellers.
I approached these courses as tools to help me develop as a writer, step by step. Each course I chose met specific needs, from drafting a manuscript to navigating the publishing world.
The courses that transformed my writing
1. The Ultimate Novel Writing Course
This was my first foray into structured learning. The Ultimate Novel Writing Course took me from a spark of an idea to a complete manuscript, offering the structure and accountability I needed. With expert guidance and peer feedback, I found myself pushing through moments of doubt and creative block. The course taught me narrative structure, character development, and, most importantly, how to finish what I started.
2. The Self-Edit Your Novel course
Once I had a manuscript, I knew the next step was refinement. The Self-Edit Your Novel course taught me how to view my work through an editor’s lens. I learned to identify areas for improvement, enhance clarity, and polish my story until it shone. This phase was truly eye-opening — it amazed me how much a focused revision process could elevate my writing.
One memorable piece of advice came from Debi Alper, who suggested I start my novel at chapter four and switch tenses. That single change transformed the pacing and impact of my thriller. She also encouraged me to imagine my protagonist as a famous actor, which resolved my struggle with their voice.
3. The Path to Publication course
With a polished manuscript in hand, Path To Publication helped me navigate the world of publishing — a realm I found both exciting and overwhelming. It provided invaluable insights into compiling a compelling query letter, synopsis, and submission package. The highlight of this course was the agent showcase, where we read our first 500 words to two agents. Their feedback was not only constructive but incredibly motivating. Receiving a full manuscript request from one of the agents less than a week later was a dream come true, and I wasn’t the only one on the course to experience this success.
Lessons learned along the way...
Each of the courses I undertook with Jericho Writers surprised me in unexpected ways. I discovered strengths in my writing I hadn’t noticed, as well as habits I needed to break. Feedback from tutors and peers was invaluable, teaching me the importance of listening and staying open to suggestions.
Some of the biggest lessons I’ve taken away include:
Resilience and Vulnerability: Sharing your work can be daunting, but it’s a necessary step in the creative process.
The Value of Revision: Editing is where the magic happens. It’s the bridge between a good draft and a great story.
Embracing Experimentation: Trying alternative approaches often leads to breakthroughs.
Connections Matter: The relationships I’ve built continue to inspire and support me.
Course highlights
The Ultimate Novel Writing Course helped me write my first novel and gave me a deep understanding of narrative structure.
The Self Edit Your Novel course boosted my confidence and taught me how to experiment with my writing.
Thanks to the Path To Publication course, the submission process is no longer a mystery, and I feel confident approaching agents and publishers.
Looking back and moving forward
These courses were more than just learning experiences for me — they were transformative. They equipped me with the tools to navigate the ups and downs of writing and publishing while fostering a sense of community that I deeply value.
If you’re considering taking the plunge, I can’t recommend Jericho Writers’ courses enough. Whether you’re starting with an idea, refining a draft, or preparing to submit, there’s a course to guide you every step of the way.
Here’s to your writing journey and all the stories waiting to be told.
Are you struggling to get started with your next writing project? Wondering which idea is the one to run with, or how to decide? Preparing for the launch of our new Premium Member course, Write With Jericho, has got me thinking about this very topic. What do you do when you have way too many ideas bouncing around in your brain? And what if you can't even decide which genre to dive into? If this sounds familiar, don't panic - I've got you covered. Let's figure it out together. (And don't forget - Write With Jericho is for Premium Members only, so be sure to join us to access this course! We'll be learning how to craft the perfect scene, so you'll be able to approach any story idea with confidence.)
1. Start with what excites you most
When you have too many ideas, start by asking yourself: which one makes you feel the most excited? Which idea has you daydreaming about characters or imagining epic plot twists? Sit with the ideas for a few days or weeks. If one idea gives you that little spark of joy and you find yourself constantly thinking about it, run with it. Writing a book is not easy. If the idea doesn’t make you bounce in your seat a little bit, it’s probably not going to be an idea you’ll want to sit with for 80k plus words and read and edit again... and again... and again. Excitement is the fuel that will keep you going.
Pro Tip: If you’re excited about it, chances are your readers will be too.
2. Create a “Battle Royale” of ideas
Take all your ideas and pit them against each other. Write a quick elevator pitch for each one and see which stands out. When I say elevator pitch, I don’t mean the kind you’d include on a query letter. I mean the quick, dirty kind that you stick on a post-it note or scribble in the middle of the night. Take a look at this masterclass from Harry Bingham if you’re unsure how to do this. If you’re torn between a thriller about a missing heirloom and a romantic comedy set in a flower shop, ask yourself: which feels fresher? Which would you rather spend months (or years) writing?
3. Test drive your ideas
You don’t have to commit right away. Write a short story, an opening chapter, or even just a scene for a few of your favourite ideas. Why not use Write With Jericho, where we’re going to be writing a scene together, to try out your idea? As a Premium Member, you’ll have access to the replays for as long as you’re a member, so if it doesn’t work out you can always take the course again with a different idea. This process can help you see which one feels the most natural to write and has the most potential for growth.
4. Combine ideas
Who says you have to choose just one? Sometimes the best stories come from blending two seemingly unrelated ideas. For example, your dystopian sci-fi concept could pair perfectly with your love for cozy mysteries. Suddenly, you’re writing about a sleuth solving crimes on a spaceship. Genre mashups can be magical – and extremely sought after by agents and publishers if they’re done well.
5. Explore your genre dilemma
If you can’t decide which genre to write, think about:
What you love to read? The genre you enjoy most as a reader might be the one you’ll enjoy writing.
Your natural strengths: Are you great at building suspense? Maybe thrillers are your calling. Do you write snappy dialogue? Consider comedy.
What scares you a little: The genre that intimidates you might be the one that helps you grow the most as a writer.
6. Look at the long game
Ask yourself: which genre do you see yourself sticking with for multiple books? If you’re hoping to build a career, it helps to establish yourself in a particular niche. That doesn’t mean you can never branch out, but if a publisher is considering offering you a book deal, they’ll want to know that you can produce multiple books in the same genre that will appeal to the same readers again and again. When I wrote my first novel, which was a sci-fi, this is exactly why I never queried it. I couldn’t see myself as a sci-fi writer. I didn’t think I could write another book in the genre, or at least, not multiple books. However, I could see myself writing lots of thrillers, so I decided to do that instead.
7. Consult your characters
Sometimes it’s the characters, not the plot, that can help you decide. Think about the people in your ideas. Which characters feel the most real or compelling? Which ones are clamoring the loudest for their story to be told? Follow their lead.
8. Set aside market pressure
It’s easy to get caught up in what’s trending. While it’s good to be aware of the market, trying to chase trends can stifle your creativity. It’s also a bit pointless. What’s trending today probably won’t be next year, so by the time you’ve written the book, edited the book, and started to query, it’s likely to no longer be in demand. Even worse – the market will probably be over-saturated by that point and you’ll be competing with writers who got there quicker than you. Instead, focus on writing what you’re passionate about. Trends come and go, but a story you love will always have value.
9. Flip a coin (seriously)
If you’re truly stuck, grab a coin. Assign an idea or genre to each side and flip. You’ll either:
Get your answer, or
Realize as the coin is mid-air which one you’re secretly rooting for.
10. Remember to have fun
Writing should be fun! Yes, it’s hard work, but it’s also your chance to create a world, fall in love with your characters, and tell a story only you can tell. Don’t stress about choosing the “right” idea. Whatever you write, it will be uniquely yours.
So, take a deep breath, pick an idea (or two!), and start typing. You’ve got this!
Don’t forget to join us as a Premium Member to take part in Write With Jericho. The first lesson is now live! You can find out more about the course right here.
A retreat from reality. A whole day, or maybe even several days, wholly devoted to writing. An opportunity to focus solely on your work-in-progress: to smash a word count goal, get under the skin of your story idea or wrestle your plot into perfect shape.
Sounds great, right? It’s no wonder that attending a writing retreat is on most authors’ wish lists for 2025 – mine included!
However, writing retreats can be prohibitively expensive, especially in the aftermath of Christmas. They can also be tough to fit into everyday life if you have other commitments to consider.
Luckily, there are ways you can bring the principles of a retreat into your own writing practice, whatever your budget and time constraints may be. Here are five helpful ideas for running your own DIY writing retreat. I hope they help you get 2025 off to a strong, creative start.
1. Pick (or prepare) a place
If spending a few hours away from home – perhaps in a particularly nice coffee shop – is an option for you, then this might be a good place to start. Alternatively, it could be that a day or two in a local hotel or B&B is within reach. If so, this could offer sufficient distance from the daily grind to boost your productivity.
If you can head further afield, that’s great, too – though (unless your retreat is also a very specific research trip) beware the temptation to book accommodation in a location where you’ll be tempted to explore. Trekking to Scotland for some peace and quiet is all very well, but you’re unlikely to get much writing done if you can’t resist checking out local hiking trails or touring whisky distilleries…
Which leads me nicely to my point. While the word ‘retreat’ probably makes you think of going away somewhere, in reality this is far less important than the decision toretreat – as in, step back – from what you normally do and think about. You could travel to a perfect, picturesque cottage in the middle of nowhere and still struggle to concentrate on writing if you can’t put down your mobile phone or silence the voice in your head that keeps whispering, ‘Don’t forget tomorrow is bin day!’
As you prepare for your DIY writing retreat – which can certainly happen in your own home – think about the distractions that typically pull you away from writing. How can you tackle them? You might consider asking a friend or partner to take charge of children or pets for a day, for example.
If you’ve booked a day or two of leave from work to write, turn your ‘office’ phone off and put it in a drawer. Refuse to think about your day job until your retreat is done! Also, make sure those around you know that just because you have booked a day off work, it doesn't mean you are ‘off’. This is not the opportunity for accepting invitations to brunch, or tackling those extra projects around the home you've been meaning to do. You're still working. It's just a different sort of work.
Give yourself permission to de-prioritise any chores and errands you’d usually get done during the time you’ve set aside for your DIY writing retreat. That said, make sure the space you’ll use for writing is clean and tidy… otherwise ‘neatening it up’ could easily become a smokescreen for procrastination.
If you’re keen to dedicate some more time to your work-in-progress but don’t have the opportunity or funds to go on a traditional writing retreat, signing up for The Ultimate Start could also be a great option for you. This one day, online writing workshop offers five tutorials with expert authors, and is designed to kickstart your creativity for the New Year. Best of all, it costs just £49 for Jericho Writers Premium Members and £99 for non-members.
2. Set strategic goals
So, you’ve decided when and where your DIY writing retreat will take place. Now it’s time to define what you want to achieve during the time you’ve set aside.
Perhaps you want to plan your next project. Maybe you have a completed draft that you’re keen to self-edit. It could be that you’re desperately trying to get to ‘the end’ with a work-in-progress, and just need some focused time to help you bring home the final act of your story.
Wherever you are on your writing journey, think about the best way to invest the time you’re devoting to your retreat. What can you get done in that period, and what impact will it have on your project overall? What aspects of writing do you normally find most difficult – and does this distraction-free time offer an opportunity to get to grips with them?
Before you begin your DIY writing retreat, you need to know upfront what ‘success’ means for you. Without a clear goal in mind, you may struggle to stay motivated – and you also risk ending without that clear, satisfying sense of crossing the finish line.
You must also make sure that, whatever goal you set, it’s realistic. If you have a single day to work on your writing, for example, don’t tell yourself you’re going to produce 10,000 perfect words. Aim for a number you know is feasible, then pat yourself on the back if you overshoot!
3. Create a schedule
The phrase ‘writing retreat’ probably conjures up cosy images of people thinking very deep, writerly thoughts, snuggled up in front of roaring fires and sipping from bottomless mugs of hot chocolate. Lovely as such images are, the truth is that you can only spend so much time contemplating and quaffing sugary beverages if you want to get stuff done.
By all means, make regular hot chocolate breaks a core component of your DIY writing retreat plan – but schedule them in advance. Make them a reward for an hour of good work. Think about how they can push you closer to achieving your goal, rather than hamper you from focusing on it.
When you’re planning your DIY writing retreat, it’s a good idea to consider in advance how you can incorporate regular meals, small treats, physical movement and rest – particularly if you’re spending more than a day on focused work. It may sound puritanical, but creating a schedule will not only help you stick to writing, planning or editing; it will also encourage you to take good care of yourself.
Through The Ultimate Start, we’re offering five workshops in a single day to help you plan a new project, review your work-in-progress or provide a fantastic framework for self-editing. You can view the schedule for the day (which includes plenty of all-important breaks!) right here on our website.
4. Prepare your resources
Think about ways you can prepare for your DIY writing retreat in advance. Could you batch cook a few meals, for instance, or stock up on healthy snacks that will keep your creativity flowing? If you’re a lover of fabulous notebooks and snazzy pens, would having a couple of new ones help motivate you during your retreat?
You’ll also want to consider more mundane things like ensuring any research notes, files or books you might need are readily available. Collect everything together in one place so that, even if you’re staying at home, you won’t waste precious time hunting for them.
Think about making sure you’re comfortable, too. If you have a favourite cushion, blanket or scented candle, incorporate this into your workspace.
Such items should be a welcome reminder that your writing retreat is supposed to be pleasurable, as well as productive. Focusing on your writing in this way is something you get to do, not something you have to do.
5. Celebrate your success (and analyse how you could improve)
When your writing retreat is over, make sure you give yourself credit for the time and effort you’ve put into it – whether or not you achieved everything you set out to.
If you didn’t quite hit your target, see if there’s anything you can learn from that. Was your word count goal too ambitious? Did you underestimate how long editing or planning certain sections of your story might take you? Or, did you find an idea you’d thought was good didn’t have legs and come up with something else instead?
So often in writing, what seems like a setback is a learning experience, or an opportunity to pivot and improve something. When you look back on what you’ve managed to do during your DIY writing retreat, consider it with positivity and without judgement. That way, you won’t be discouraged from carving out time for another writing retreat in future – and you’ll be even better equipped to make the most of it.
So, there you have it! Five tips for creating a DIY writing retreat that will help you start your writing year right.
And if you’d like to find out more about the affordable mini ‘writing retreat’ we’re running for online this January, check out The Ultimate Start page on our website.
We could say that, broadly, the centre of a narrative should mark the zenith of its arc – and therefore, it is the pivotal point of the story. If your book loses momentum around this point, that’s problematic.
So how do you avoid the dreaded saggy middle? Here are some ideas to implement.
1. Consider a twist at the mid-point
This will inject your plot with energy and propel the text on.
Might one of your protagonist’s friends or allies betray them, offering new interest and prompting the reader to reconsider assumptions they’ve made?
Conversely, someone the reader had thought was a villain may turn out to be something else. Perhaps they are more subtle, more intriguing, than they first seemed? Maybe that villain is wrestling with their own conflict, or fulfilling a role forced upon them.
Thinking more about assumptions, could you offer something subversive here? Maybe a character readers have assumed to be truthful has been lying throughout the story so far. Or is your narrator less dependable than they seemed?
What happens need not be a cataclysm; it could just be a series of hints to unsettle and intrigue your reader. All these things may come earlier or later in your novel – but do consider them here and see if they ignite your book.
2. Up the stakes
Often, a saggy middle comes from a lack of increase in stakes. What are the consequences if your protagonist succeeds or fails in their mission? What if it looks as though they might not answer the questions you posed earlier in the book? You could make the need to solve a problem more urgent, or introduce an additional element of danger or risk. You could add a setback or two.
We don’t want your protagonist to arrive too smoothly at their destination. Do elements of the plot fall into place too neatly? In that case, the book might struggle to keep momentum as it moves towards its climax.
Adding a setback, or a series of setbacks, around the halfway point is an effective way to keep the book alive. By creating new jeopardy and complexity, you’ll lead the reader on, making them wonder how the protagonist is going to recover. This is a terrific technique because wanting to know the answers to questions is instinctual in all of us – particularly when the questions are thorny!
Added to this is the question of whether your protagonist’s (and other characters’) emotional arcs need to be more expansive. Have you tied their development closely enough to the setbacks they’re experiencing? Consider whether more is needed to develop and build to sustain the fascination of your reader with your characters from this point.
3. Add more action
Does your novel need more action at this stage? How might you add drama and tension?
The action need not be physical – it can take many forms, depending on genre, plot and your readership. Consider an argument, where long-held resentments come to the surface; or perhaps a revelation that leaves one or more characters reeling. Whatever happens, will it open the way to further engaging twists, setbacks, and developments? Will it make your reader keep turning the page?
4. Experiment with editing
Just how badly is your book’s middle sagging? Is it time to make some cuts?
Read the text aloud. Are you bored? If so, that’s a sign some trimming is needed. I have found that when a writer doesn’t know how to get from one point to another, their text may be mired in unnecessary dialogue, small events which do nothing to advance the plot (however lovely the language) or an efflorescence of detail that just grounds the book.
Sometimes writers tell me they need to include lots of detail at this point because it is immersive for the reader. But the opposite can be true: it can be a drag factor. It might be that you are actively creating a saggy middle!
In general, your reader needs less detail than you do – so consider whether there is just too much here. It can be a painful process, but it is part of authoring a book. Being tough on yourself here is excellent training, too – not least because edits are part of the process of bringing a novel to market.
Bonus tip: if you do decide to trim your text, remember to keep any content you remove from your manuscript in a separate, clearly labelled, dated document. You never know – you may want to add it back in later, or even place it somewhere else in the text.
Hopefully, these ideas are useful for you. Above all, please know that saggy middles are a common problem – and definitely something you can fix!
So, you’re ready to get serious about your creative writing ambitions. Keen to hone your craft. Committed to writing more words, more consistently than you ever have before. Maybe you’re finally feeling brave enough to share your work with others: a nerve-wracking step that (in my experience) is far less scary, and far more helpful, than it’s possible to imagine upfront.
Assuming the above isn’t too wide of the mark, you’re probably considering a creative writing course. I found myself in just that position five years ago, and I maintain that participating in one made a crucial difference to my motivation and self-belief. I’ve since written four completed books, three of which have been traditionally published. The fourth is due out next year.
But how do you know which are the best online creative writing courses?
The short answer is, it’s not easy! Picking the right course is a challenge: there’s a huge array of options out there. One size does not fit all, and it’s important to ensure that, whatever sum you invest, it yields the help and support you need.
In this blog post, I’m going to share my thoughts on 10 important things to look for, to identify the best online creative writing courses before you make your decision.
1. Reviews and testimonials
Positive feedback from previous students is a sure sign that a creative writing course is worth considering. Think not only about the number of starred reviews a course gets; read detailed testimonials if they’re available, so you can get a clear sense of individuals’ experiences and what the course has helped them achieve.
Ask yourself: what does this course promise, and what does it deliver for the people who participate? If those two things match up, you could be onto a winner. If not, it makes sense to look elsewhere.
2. Reputable instructors
When you put yourself – and your beloved novel idea! – into the hands of experts who promise to help you, it’s important to make sure they really are experts. You need to feel confident that the people teaching on your creative writing course are credible. What publishing experience do they have? How many years does it go back? Have they won awards or prizes? Have their previous students found success?
Just as importantly, you should look at the kind of writing a tutor or mentor works with and assess whether they’re a good fit for you. If you’re a committed fantasy writer, for example, it’s important for you to work with someone who both understands and enjoys your chosen genre. The Jericho Writers Ultimate Novel Writing Course tutors have a wide variety of specialisms, and we aim to match these as closely as possible to the projects of the individuals they work with.
Another thing to consider is how well you feel you’ll gel with whoever will be teaching your course. Sharing your writing with anyone means making yourself vulnerable, and trust is a key component of the relationship you’ll forge with any creative writing tutor.
3. Flexibility
It’s important to think about how a creative writing course will fit into your life. The best course for you is always the one you will actuallyparticipatein.
No matter what its merits or how much money you’ve put into it, if a course is structured in a way that makes it impossible for you to commit – perhaps because the schedule is rigid and you’re already dealing with work, domestic and family pressures – you won’t reap its full benefits.
Online creative writing courses offer more flexibility than in-person options, but they don’t all work in the same way. Take a close look at how any course you’re considering works in practice, so you can decide whether you’ll be able to participate on terms that work for you.
At the same time, don’t be afraid to decide that now is the moment to start carving out space on your calendar for writing. The trick is balancing this determination with a dash of realism. In my experience, both are important ingredients if you intend to bake a whole book.
4. High quality course content
Don’t be shy about digging through the full syllabus of any creative writing course you’re considering. What, exactly, does it cover? What are the key topics you’ll study? How relevant do you feel they are for you and your project?
Personally, I’m a fan of the blended approach – one that covers the craft of writing, plus how the publishing industry works. The beauty of an online course like the Ultimate Novel Writing Course is that it offers the best of both worlds: a focus on the nitty-gritty of characterisation and plotting (such as you’d find on a creative writing MA course), plus additional support with understanding how to get your work published.
5. One-to-one mentoring
Working with a mentor can make all the difference to your self-confidence, as well as the quality of your story. While some creative writing courses offer regular one-to-one sessions with a tutor, others don’t – and it’s important to know at the outset how much individual attention you’ll get from whoever is teaching you.
We offer two versions of the Ultimate Novel Writing Course, and our FULL package includes monthly one-to-one mentoring with your tutor, as well as two one-to-one sessions with a literary agent at the end of the course.
Students who choose our CORE package get a single session with a literary agent and have the option to book one-to-one mentoring with their course tutor should they wish to upgrade.
6. Detailed, personalised feedback
Actionable feedback on your writing is among the most important things you should look for in a creative writing course, whether you’re studying online or IRL. Good questions to think about include: how much of your novel-in-progress will your tutor read? Note that, in some cases, it won’t be your full manuscript. Will you receive a written report on your work? If so, how much detailed advice will it contain?
In my view, a tutor who can look at big-picture stuff (such as your character arcs and overall plot structure) as well as how skilfully you craft individual scenes and dialogue, is definitely worth having in your corner.
Students who opt for the FULL Ultimate Novel Writing Course package get a complete manuscript assessment as part of the course. This means their tutor will read their full novel (up to 100,000 words) and deliver a report of up to 4,000 words on its strengths and development areas, as well as how to perfect it.
7. Publishing industry insight
This links back to the credibility of your course tutors, but I think it’s important enough to merit a specific mention. The publishing industry is complicated, competitive and constantly changing. Whether your ambition is to self-publish or submit to literary agents and hope for a traditional deal, it’s vital to understand how everything works.
Look for a creative writing course that will support your understanding of the various ways to publish, as well as their pros and cons. Ideally, find one that’s taught by people who’ve been there and done it – and who still have their fingers on the pulse.
8. Opportunities for discovery
Imagine: you’ve shown up consistently and grafted hard to write your novel. You’ve taken on board your tutor’s feedback and edited your work, fine-tuning it so it’s finally ready to be shared more widely.
What’s next? Ideally, if your creative writing course has got you this far, it will help you get your work out there, too – probably by helping you put it in front of literary agents.
Many creative writing courses offer students the opportunity to have their work featured in a collection that’s shared with agencies, but make sure you know precisely what’s on offer before signing up.
All students on the Ultimate Novel Writing Course are offered the opportunity to submit their work for our anthology, and will also receive feedback from our agency partners on their novels’ commercial potential. CORE students get a single one-to-one session with an agent, while FULL package students get two.
9. Ongoing support
Writing is joyful, but it also has its difficult, dispiriting and lonely moments. No author is immune, whether they’ve produced one book or twenty, and no matter how much publishing success they may have had.
That’s why a creative writing course that offers ongoing support – from the provider, and / or from your fellow students – is well worth thinking about. I finished my creative writing course in 2019 but, like many Jericho Writers alumni, I’m still in touch with several of my classmates. It’s a pleasure to be able to review and help promote one another’s books, and half a decade on we’re still celebrating each other’s successes.
All Ultimate Novel Writing Course students retain access to their course materials for life, so they can revisit key lessons at any time. I also think it’s great that the FULL Ultimate Novel Writing Course package includes two years of Premium Membership to Jericho Writers. The best authors never stop learning, and accessing live masterclasses and video courses is a great way to keep pushing yourself.
10. Value for money
Finally, you need to consider how much you’re able and willing to spend on your creative writing course before you commit. Prices vary hugely, but so does what providers include – so I’d urge you to think carefully about a course’s long-term benefits and whether it offers value for money, as well as its upfront cost.
Spending a few hundred pounds on a short course that kick-starts your creativity may well be the best choice for you right now. Conversely, you might be ready to invest a bigger sum, and significantly more time, in developing yourself as an author.
We’ve designed the Ultimate Novel Writing Course to offer everything we think beginner and intermediate writers need to complete high quality, publishable novels and prepare to seek publishing deals. However, we also offer a host of other writing courses and editorial services – and if you’d like some help with working out what’s right for you, you can book a free consultation with a member of our team. Honesty is one of our core values, so you can rest assured that if we don’t think the Ultimate Novel Writing Course is right for you, we’ll say so. We’ll also suggest a more suitable alternative if we can.
So there you have it! My quick (ish...) 10 point guide to figuring out which are the best online creative courses out there.
You can find out more about the Ultimate Novel Writing Course, and download the full course brochure, right here on our website.
When I started work on my first novel, I didn’t set out to write something funny. My priority was to craft something relatable: a story that would resonate with readers, as well as entertain them.
In pursuit of realism, I hit upon an important truth: real life – mine, anyway – involves endless mishaps, missteps and mistakes that can either be laughed at or cried over. Like most of us, I typically choose to chuckle – and pretty quickly, I found myself squeezing something sweet from the proverbial lemons my protagonists’ lives served up, too.
Three (almost four!) books in, I feel like I’ve found my comedy groove. Here are five things I’ve learned about writing to raise a smile – or, if you’re lucky, a belly laugh – from your reader.
1. Characters drive comedy (and plot)
In almost every funny book, film or play there’ll be at least one character who’s inherently amusing. Sometimes this will be because they subvert a cliché: think Sister Michael, the hilariously misanthropic nun from Lisa McGee’s Derry Girls.
Elsewhere, a character might have comedy chops because they embody a cliché. Jane Austen’s Mr Collins epitomises the kind of pompous, hectoring clergyman that nobody wants to sit next to in the drawing room.
If you’re creating a purely comedic character, bear in mind that they can’t exist only for the lols. They must serve a purpose or advance your plot. Sister Michael is the Derry Girls’ main antagonist, frequently an obstacle to their scheming. Meanwhile, when Lizzy, the plucky heroine of Pride and Prejudice, rejects Mr Collins’ proposal, he marries her friend instead. This throws Lizzy more squarely into the path of Mr Darcy, who (spoiler alert!) is her perfect match.
2. Don’t pull your punches – but throw them carefully
An important note on ‘laugh at’ characters: always punch up, not down. If you’re inviting your readers to find someone ridiculous, make sure they deserve it – and that they’re risible by choice.
Self-importance, snobbery and wilful ignorance are awful qualities in a dinner party guest, but brilliant foibles for a character you want readers to find funny.
My advice for writing such a person? Imagine someone you’d actively avoid in the workplace, would hide from at a family wedding or might refuse to get in a lift with, just in case it got stuck. Then, make them ten times worse.
3. Be specific
Close attention to detail can really help you nail a comedy character. Do they have a ridiculously elaborate hairstyle, or waft around in a cloud of too-strong perfume? Have they adopted a super posh, royal family-style accent, despite being from a small town in the middle of nowhere?
Think about little things that will help you to show, not tell, why this person is begging to be laughed at.
4. Comedy and empathy are cousins
Your next step is to force your poor, unsuspecting main character to interact with whoever you’ve just made up. If you’re as mean as I am, you might make the supercilious dullard their boss, or the interfering, hysterical fusspot their mother.
Putting someone your readers care about in a toe-curlingly awkward situation is not only a quick way to garner laughs – it’s a powerful way to stoke empathy, too. Who among us hasn’t experienced crushing embarrassment, or the intense frustration of having to be polite to someone they’d prefer to give a piece of their mind?
Comedy is a brilliant way to undercut a problem or circumstance that might otherwise feel bleak and depressing. In David Nicholls’ The Understudy, the protagonist is a failing actor. His hopelessness is underlined by the non-verbal role he’s playing as the novel opens: that of a dead body in a crime drama.
Far from sugarcoating the situation, the humour invites readers in – laughter somehow makes us participants in the story, rather than passive observers. From page one, the reader is invested in seeing this protagonist’s life get better. After all, it’s difficult not to root for someone who’s making a living by pretending to be dead.
5. Layer your lols
Some books – The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, for instance – have humour hardwired into their basic premise. However, even giving your book a funny foundation doesn’t guarantee you’ll keep readers amused over several hundred pages.
As you’re writing, keep an eye out for opportunities to include humorous moments that feel natural: witty asides, snappy dialogue, misunderstandings and embarrassments. These can be blended with ‘bigger ticket’ comedy incidents you’ve planned more deliberately. The main thing to remember is that the laughs you add to your story are like seasoning. Think of comedy like salt on a chip, or sauce on a steak. Too much could overpower your plot, but the right amount will sharpen, enhance and enrich other aspects of your writing.
Genre. It’s a bloody minefield, isn’t it? If anything (other than writing a synopsis) is going to turn us into inarticulate, sweating messes, this is it. But honestly, genre needn’t be that complicated.
A big reason we get in such a muddle is that there is a muddle over what genre “means”. Agents, editors and booksellers often include publishing or marketing categories, so we end up talking about “romantasy”, “cli-fi”, “uplit”, “bookclub fiction” “upmarket/crossover/accessible literary fiction” and heaven knows what else.
Many of these publishing terms actually refer to setting (e.g. modern-day / historical / fantasy / dystopia), literary style (e.g. comic / poetic / accessible / noir), or target audiences (e.g. teenagers / book clubs).
But by genre, I mean what type of story it fundamentally is.
Think of a chair, table, bed or lamp. Each of these is a basic “genre” of furniture, with specific elements we recognise and expect. For example: legs so it stands on the floor; a surface to sit on; some kind of backrest (ta-dah! A Chair). A Chair can be metal, wood, plastic; cheap or expensive; French-made or Chinese. But if I go to a furniture store for a chair, and I’m shown something without these key elements (or worse, something that’s half-chair, half-lamp), I’ll be pretty annoyed.
Main Story genres (not an exhaustive list) include:
Love
Crime
Action
Thriller
Performance
Coming-of-age
As with different “furniture genres”, each has certain elements and conventions (even tropes) readers will expect. For example, the core conventions of a Crime story include:
(Discovery of) a crime
A detective who investigates
Clues
Red herrings
The villain is unmasked
Core Love story conventions include:
Lovers meet
First kiss
Lovers break up
Proof of love
Lovers commit
If I pick up a book expecting a Love story (because the cover or blurb suggest that it is), but it doesn’t fulfil these conventions, I’m going to be annoyed and hurl the book on the floor.
“But won’t that make my book boring, if my Love story has the same things in it as every other Love story?”
No! Because just as you can create a Chair that’s the most unique and innovative Chair ever seen, you can write the most unique and innovative Love Story ever. It doesn’t matter that your chair is still fundamentally a Chair. Ditto, the fact that your story *is* recognisably a Love story is not going to put readers off — quite the opposite.
The trick is not to break or ignore the conventions, but innovate them.
Here are some of my favourite examples of stories that innovate brilliantly on their basic genre conventions (or tropes). (Recognise them? Answers at the end!)
Genre
Genre Conventions/Tropes
Innovation
Love
Girl meets boy
Boy is vampire
Crime
Detective who investigates
Detectives are ten-year-olds Grace and Tilly
Action
Bad guy(s) threaten a community
Jaws — but in space
Psych Thriller
Man murders wife
Woman sets up husband for the death penalty by faking her own murder
Performance
Music/sports/arts team compete for a prize
Jamaican athletes enter Winter Olympics
Coming of age
A naive protagonist must learn complexities of adult world
Naive protagonist becomes Empowered Woman by dancing the Mambo with Patrick Swayze
Top tips:
1. Get clear on the Story (not “marketing”) genre you’re writing. A clue can be the stories you love to read.
2. Read (or watch) lots of examples, especially “masterworks”. Pull out the recurring elements: these are your genre conventions.
3. Make sure you honour these in your own story. Readers will expect them, so don’t let them down.
4. Use your creative powers to innovate the conventions. What version of the “meet cute” have we never seen? How is your detective different to the many other fictional detectives? What’s a brilliantly original “hero-at-the-mercy-of-the-villain” scene (don’t tie them to chair AGAIN!)?
I hope this whistle-stop tour of Story Genre has been helpful. You can find out more on my Twitter threads.
'Whirlwind' is the perfect word to describe Ania Card's writing journey from writing her first novel, embarking on a summer of mentoring and landing an agent and a publishing deal within a year. The result? Above Us the Sea was published July 2024 by Dead Ink Books, an acclaimed indie publisher based in the UK. Ania's debut is a heart-rendering novel that explores the complexities of young love and identity with sparkling prose. We were thrilled to catch up with Ania and hear all about how Above Us the Sea came to life.
Hi Ania, thanks so much for taking the time to catch up with us. Can you tell us a little about where you were in your journey before working with Donna and what that experience was like?
At the time when I was about to apply for mentorship with Jericho Writers, I had been through two drafts of Above Us The Sea. I had no creative writing or literary background and had been to exactly one writing event.
I believed in my story but, alas, had no idea how good it was or how it could get better and what my ability as a writer was. I was basically a ball of insecurity, but a ball that was eager to learn.
I was thinking about my options; I had always been shy in groups and always preferred one-to-one contact. I also felt like the novel was pretty much in shape (ha! the sweet hindsight!). I didn’t need to be motivated to write: I needed an expert eye and guidance on what to do next.
I submitted my manuscript to Jericho Writers and was matched with Donna Freitas. Within a couple of weeks she came to me with feedback. Donna started off by sending me a detailed report on the entire manuscript that spanned a few pages. She outlined key issues with the manuscript and identified areas that needed a bit more work.
It was great to have that overview to refer back to as we worked through individual sections one by one. We focused on a section per Zoom call and Donna would always leave me with homework for our next call. I had next to zero belief in myself at that point, desperately needing validation to keep going. Donna’s love and enthusiasm for the novel in those early stages was the fuel I needed.
That’s amazing. Mentoring can be such a nurturing process, but it’s also so collaborative. What was that process like for you?
I was repeatedly blown away by Donna’s insightful remarks and ideas. It was so invigorating and such a joy to be able to talk about the novel in this new (for me) way; reconstructing, building, doubting and taking risks. I always say that those two months working with Donna were my creative writing learning on speed. I didn’t know a thing about character arcs, stakes, building tension or story structure when we started, all and any of those essential writing craft terms completely foreign to me.
We had a few Zoom calls together and I left each one buzzing with ideas, wanting to do better, improving and learning. With Donna’s help, I felt invincible – together we could do great things.
And those big, scary things we did: we moved chapters and sections, threw away characters... We binned the opening section and one in the middle, too, and under Donna’s guidance and a deadline, I fully rewrote the novel twice, making my biggest cuts and edits. There was one moment when I had to completely rewrite two sections and compress them into one, and I almost crumbled under the scope of it. Donna believed I could easily do it in a month, and because she had that faith in me, I believed in my ability, too. I handed in the edits within a month.
You must have both worked incredibly hard during those two months! How would you say Donna’s mentoring helped you not only finish your manuscript but polish it to the point you knew it was ready to go out into the world?
Donna always pushed me to do better and use every opportunity to raise the stakes. The stakes was what was ringing in my ears for months! I had always been a character writer; emotions and interior worlds were my strengths. I crumbled and cried at the feet of a plot, a timeline and stakes (timeline had me tearing my hair out at points). But by the end of our time working together, I felt I had a much stronger grasp of all three.
I had new skills, and I had this new confidence in my ability as a writer. By the end of two months, Donna was confident the work was ready to be sent out to agents. In our last meeting, she still pointed out a few small things that might benefit the story further and I actually ended up implementing those further down the line.
Fantastic. What happened next?
I signed with my agent Clare Coombes from The Liverpool Literary Agency only two months after working with Donna. We worked through minor edits over the summer and went on submission in November 2022. I signed with Dead Ink Books in February 2023 and the finished novel was published last month.
To say that my novel benefited hugely from having a mentor would be an understatement. It did, completely, but I have also become a far better writer, smashing my own glass ceilings time and time again.
Your journey has been such a whirlwind. Is there anything you wished you had known earlier, or been prepared for?
Oh, there would be so many things! In hindsight, having connected to many debut authors over the last few months, I now know that everyone’s publication journey is completely different. It’s hard to have expectations in our industry where there are no guarantees. I would say to all writers embarking on this journey, go with the flow, say yes to opportunities coming your way and enjoy all moments, and always come back to writing. This is what we do and it’s the only thing in our control.
Do you have any advice for writers working on their first draft?
Don’t be afraid to make mistakes and write bad sentences, bad paragraphs and bad chapters. It’s all part of the process. There are so many ways to write, structure, plot, build characters, there are many writing routines, none of them are right or wrong. Choose your own adventure, one that works for you because there are no right or wrong answers. Read as much as you can, and read for joy. Make connections, connect with writers, booksellers, book influencers, your own writing community can be your rock through the good and tough times, and the lovely booksellers and book influencers are absolute heroes of our industry and champions of our stories.
Can you let us know what are you working on now?
I am currently working on my second novel. It’s still in very early stages but I’m so excited at every opportunity to dive back into it, which hasn’t been easy post-publication. It’s set in Brighton and spans an eco-thriller, a climate anxiety story, a bit of folklore, AIDS epidemic and as those themes always bubble at the edges of me; looks at identity and migration with a touch of the surreal I can never resist!
Submissions are at an all-time high, and not every agent is the right fit for every project. So, understanding where your book fits in is essential. It’s not because agents are lazy – it’s because we have to be selective.
How you present your manuscript gives us a sense of your vision for it. If we can tell that your vision for your book is different than ours, it’s probably a sign that it won’t be a very fruitful artistic partnership.
So here are some steps to help figure out where your book fits in this market:
Ask yourself, is my book really for children?
What is your age category?
What are your comparative titles? Ideally, these should highlight what you think are the strongest or most important features of your book
Does your book fill a gap in the market?
Let’s take a closer look at each of these steps.
Is my book for children?
Children’s books are not about adults. Unless you are the ghost of Roald Dahl, your book needs a child protagonist. Arguably, there needs to be other children too, so they’re not just surrounded by adults.
Of course, there are books with animals and even objects – but even though they’re not an actual child, they’re usually child-like. Children’s books need to be about things that children care about, that see the world the way they do.
So my first step is to ask – is this book for children? Does it feature adult characters, dealing with things in their adult way?
Or, does it go too far in the other direction? Does it feature a child character, but told through a reflective lens of an adult perspective? Or is the content, even if it features a young child, not accessible to a child reader? Sometimes stories that are about children are not written for children, but are very adult handlings of very mature subjects.
What is your age category?
We know that it’s exhausting to constantly be asked to categorise your work, especially by age. But here’s the truth: publishing is a business. Publishers are selling a product. Booksellers (read: superheroes) need to make it as easy as possible for consumers to make the best choice in their selection. And we, in turn, want to make it as easy as possible for them to do that.
While categories in publishing may seem restrictive, we have these categories for the same reason that a supermarket has different sections – so that consumers know what they’re getting, and it’s easy for them to find it. When you need milk, you go to the dairy section. If you want to find a book that is aimed at a 6-year-old, you go to that section.
I did say ‘aimed at’ – this is important. Even if your 10-year-old is incredibly advanced, books for 16-year-olds can deal with things like abusive relationships, drug use, sex, mental illness, through the lens of a teenager who may be experiencing it. Just because a 10-year-old can read it, that doesn’t mean that it’s appropriate for them. Books aimed at 10-year-olds can deal with the same issues, but it’s handled with that age group in mind.
There is a lot of work done to provide age-appropriate stories for teenagers who maybe aren’t as seasoned as readers – if you want to write a story for a reluctant or struggling reader, who’s aged 15, great!
Comparative titles
Comparative titles shouldn’t feel like homework. They’re telling us so much about how you see your book.
Agents hope to see that you haven’t written your book in a vacuum. The best writers are readers, so we would expect that you’re reading widely in that space. That you understand your audience and what they’re reading. That you know what’s doing well with that age group.
But I do have some tips to make it easier if you’re really struggling.
For a start, stake out a bookshop. See what’s on the tables – they’re normally more recent publications. Picking a title that’s relatively recent shows us you’re keeping up to date and want to stay informed on the market. Talk to the bookseller! Ask them what’s popular, what’s selling, what people are asking for.
For a second comparative title, you don’t have to choose a book. You can choose a TV show or movie that you really related to, as long as it’s aimed at (more or less) your target demographic.
You can also isolate the elements of a book that you think add to your pitch but maybe overall, it’s not the right fit. Think about things like writing style, setting or time period, dynamics or tropes in the main relationships. You can say that your manuscript combines an element from Book X with something else from TV show Y. Play around with it.
Does your book fill a gap in the market?
I want to be clear here that I’m not talking about writing something specifically to fill a gap. Write what you want to write, write what you love! But you can always pitch something in a way that suggests it’s filling a gap.
The best way to do that is not to be cocky or arrogant. Don’t tell us “no one is writing about this” or “there are no books addressing this”. But what you can do is say, “I think my book would be perfect for readers who are ready to graduate from X” or “readers who aren’t ready for Y” – if you can highlight in that sentence along that there isn’t a lot of material for readers who are ready to graduate from a certain series or brand, that’s a USP that strengthens your pitch. See if you can find a gap that your manuscript fills? For example, I see a lot of calls for more STEM-based stories nowadays. Does your manuscript have a STEM aspect that you can talk about? I would never suggest changing or writing something to fit a trend, but if there is a part of your manuscript that fills a gap, let us know. If your book is the perfect next step (often a step up in difficulty) from a popular book, you’re creating a place for yourself in the market.
Ultimately, we want you to love your book as much as you did when you first sent it to us. It’s our job to sell it, but if you and your agent aren’t on the same wavelength about what you’ve written, along the way someone gets let down. So we ask that you give us a good sense of the book you want us to expect, so that we can find the perfect home for it!
From judging competitions, overseeing writer’s editorial services, being keen bookworms and writers of books ourselves, we’ve read a lot of first pages. There are many ways to tackle the opening of your story, so how do you make an informed decision that best suits your story?
First, let’s go back to basics.
The first page makes a promise to the reader. (So does the blurb, cover and pitch – but that’s another story for another day.) The opening lines tell the reader 'this is what you’re getting yourself into' and asks 'do you want to come along for the ride?'
When a reader is deciding whether they want to spend approximately 8-10 hours or 300+ pages with your book, you want to make the best first impression. So, how do we do it?
Our most important piece of advice? Save something for later.
Consistently, we hear agents and publishers turn down submissions that contain too much, too soon.
It's important to remember that stories are built from units of change. A reader wants (and expects) to see new details emerge, for the characters to evolve and reveal hidden sides of themselves.
By parcelling out information and aspects of your character, you can not only strike the balance between hooking your reader’s attention and overwhelming them, but you can offer them something new throughout the story.
Trust your reader. Let information unspool slowly and with care.
What is your opening image?
This first moment should achieve several things for your story:
Establish normalcy. What does this world look like on this particular day? What stage is the character at in their own life?
Establish a tension or instability, something that signals change is not only coming, it is necessary to the story. What challenges does the character face? Note: we’re not saying the change or inciting incident need to happen right away, but there should be signs, even if your character is unaware of them.
With this in mind, have a think about the moment you have chosen to start your story. Why now? If it doesn’t achieve the above, consider how you can adjust the timeline to capture your reader’s attention. And remember the advice: start late, finish early.
Now we’ve chosen our first moment, ask yourself are you ‘telling’ what you could ‘show’?
Full disclaimer, we believe that the ‘show don’t tell’ rule can be unhelpful to writers when followed blindly. Both are tools and have their purpose within a novel. Debi Alper’s Psychic Distance masterclass is an essential watch for all writers, but especially those wanting to understand the push and pull between show and tell.
Another way of talking about show and tell is scene versus summary.
A scene is in real-time. It is action, on the spot reflection, (and if you aren’t telling the story in 1st person and present tense, a narrator’s commentary but for more on this do go and watch Debi’s masterclass).
Narrative summary is exactly as described. It is writing that spans time in the story and it might include specific details and dialogue (and we think that it should contain both to create strong visual images in the reader’s mind).
For the opening of a novel you want to immerse your reader efficiently. This means, by providing enough detail to snag their attention, but not too much that you run the risk of overwhelming your reader with too much story, information or worldbuilding all at once.
A scene is an excellent way to do this, but before we dive in let’s look at some examples.
Pick up a few books that you’ve already read (so you are aware of the full narrative shape, and crucially, how it ends) and see how they open. Do they begin with scenes? Do any begin with summary instead?
Look at an example that starts with summary and think about why you think the author chose to do this. Are they using a retrospective point of view, with the narrator is looking back on events from afar and capturing a period of time? How long do they do this before moving into a scene? As you might find, there are plenty of books that open with narrative summary and do it well.
The Principle of Moments by Esmie Jikiemi-Pearson begins with small sections of narrative summary told in quick succession. It breaks lots of ‘rules’ but with good reason that suits the style, the genre and the story being told.
Through quick glimpses into this world, the reader gains an instant and rich impression of the story we are about to step into. There is no info-dumping or heavy world-building, tension and impending change is established, and we are left wanting to know more.
If you want to take a look for yourself, you can view a sample of The Principle of Moments over on Amazon here.
Remember, if it makes sense for your story and engages readers, there are no rules to what you can and can’t do.
Now, we’ve discussed why you might begin by summarising events (though we caution against it as it is difficult to do well), let’s end with a brief note about scenes.
Find a book that opens with a scene.
What do you learn about the world the story takes place in? It doesn’t need to be set in a fantasy land or another planet, it can be a world similar to our own, but crucially, it’ll be dramatized by the author in a deliberate way.
As you read, note down what information you learn about the world. How do they deliver this information? Has the author trusted you to draw any conclusions? Are you left with questions or wanting to find out more?
Are there specific details that the author draw your attention to? If you know how the book ends, why do you think this is?
…
We hope this helps you consider how you open your novel in a more meaningful and deliberate way.
This may seem an odd thing for the tutor of Jericho’s Simply Self-Publish course to say, but I strongly believe that self-publishing is a misnomer. Here’s why.
Although self-publishing is author-centric, from first draft to finished book, the author is not the only person involved. Nor is the process DIY.
Self-publishing is not a game of solitaire, but a team effort. Successful self-published authors employ experts such as editors and cover designers to ensure their books match the quality of those traditionally-published.
Self-publishing may be author-driven, but it’s not only about fulfilling the author’s desires.
By all means, write the book you want to read – but also focus on what the market wants. Respect readers by making your book the best it can be. Don’t insult your readers by letting typos, plot holes or continuity errors through. Brand your book with a genre-appropriate cover so that it appeals to the kind of reader who would enjoy it. Publish on the right platforms and in the right formats to reach as many readers as possible.
Thinking of skipping ebooks because you prefer print? Do so at your peril: most indie authors make most of their sales and profits from ebooks.
Planning to bypass Amazon because you don’t like shopping there yourself? Only if you don’t mind skipping the biggest book sales platform in the world.
“You are not your reader” is a useful mantra to keep in mind.
Self-publishing does not operate in isolation from the mainstream book market.
Indeed, it shares many of the same production and distribution platforms as traditionally-published books. Although the business model is different, if you follow my recommended process to self-publish, your books will appear not only on online stores such as Amazon and Apple, but also on physical bookstores’ websites. Readers who prefer not to order books online may order your paperbacks and hardbacks from their local bookshop. You can also make your self-published books available to public libraries via their preferred distribution networks.
There’s no hard demarcation line between self-publishing and traditional publishing.
You don’t have to pick one or the other: you can be both. Many self-published authors go on to sign up with traditional publishers who headhunt new writers from self-publishing success stories. Savvy self-published authors selectively license the rights to the intellectual property that their books represent. While continuing to self-publish in your own language, you might license translations to specialist traditional publishers, e.g. French language editions to French publishers, or self-publish ebooks and print while licensing audiobooks to audio specialists.
Similarly, authors whose publishers want only limited rights, e.g. to a particular language, format, or territory, may self-publish different editions to reach more readers. Equally, when your contracts with traditional publishers expire (usually after five to seven years), and you get your rights back, you can create a new lease of life for those works by self-publishing them.
So, if I don’t like the term self-publishing, what do I prefer? “Independent publishing” or “indie publishing” has gained traction over the last few years. However, it’s not to be confused with “indie publishers”, who are essentially any publishing companies who are not affiliated to the main industry players.
I prefer the term “indie author” to “self-published author”, but as the boundaries between the indie and traditional sectors blur, I’d rather just call us all authors, however our books are published.
...
If this article is making the prospect of self-publishing seem more complex and daunting than you first imagined, help is at hand. Twice a year, in spring and autumn, I teach Jericho Writers’ Simply Self-Publish course.
In ten weekly modules, I walk you gently through the process and fast-track you to self-publishing competence and confidence, with personal feedback and advice specific to your book(s) and to your goals.
Many course alumni have gone on to self-publish at least one book to professional standards, and many more are in the pipeline. Could yours be next? I hope so!
The journey to becoming an author can be full of challenges. Without support, guidance and a healthy dose of resilience, it can feel all too tempting to give up. A shining example of why you should always believe in yourself and never give up is author and former Ultimate Novel Writing Course student Dani Raanan. We caught up with Dani following some exciting news to reflect on her journey so far and what she's learned along the way.
Hi Dani, thank you so much for chatting to us about your writing journey. One thing that strikes us about your story is how determined you are.
Hi, thank you for giving me this opportunity! It feels wild to be in this position and to be able to talk about this with you. It’s kind you think I’m determined – doggedly stubborn is more how I feel sometimes!
You recently signed with John Jarrold (from the John Jarrold Literary Agency) after completing the Ultimate Novel Writing Course, can you tell us a little about that experience?
John was actually an agent I discovered years before I wrote The Crafter’s Wife on the Ultimate Novel Writing Course. I queried him previously because I really felt that his specialisation and portfolio of current authors (all fantasy, science-fiction and/or horror writers) fitted me perfectly and that he’d be such a great champion for my work. It was his rejection letter that lit the fire in me to apply for the UNWC. I didn’t want my work to just be good. I wanted it to be special. He was therefore one of the first agents I queried after completing the course.
In his true fashion, he replied promptly telling me he would read it within two weeks, and if he hadn’t got back to me by then, to nudge him. After two weeks, I did – he then requested the full within two days. A week later, I had an offer. His level of communication blew my mind (and it still does – communication is so important to me, and I so appreciate his courtesy and transparency).
I ultimately had three full requests for Crafter’s Wife – two through opportunities with the course, and the one ‘slushpile’ offer from John. Of course, I let the other two agents know when John offered – I am actually still yet to hear back from one! Two weeks later, I signed with John, and I haven’t looked back. We’re deep in submission territory now – please keep fingers crossed for me!
What a whirlwind! I know that everyone here at Jericho Writers is wishing you the best of luck on submission. You’ve mentioned before about how your UNWC tutor Philip Womack helped you build confidence in your writing during the year on the course. Have you got any advice for writers struggling with their confidence?
Oof, that’s a toughy. The great thing about Philip was that he didn’t need to like my work. He was there to be brutally honest with me and to thus help me learn and improve. I think that’s a crucial thing – getting eyes on your work that don’t feel compelled to be kind [and perhaps inadvertently or with the best intentions lie] to you. Our partners, our friends – they mean well but haven’t always got the beauty or clarity of objectivity. So oddly enough, I think putting yourself out there actually helps build confidence. Joining writers’ groups, going to festivals, chatting to agents and editors – embedding yourself within the world you want to be a part of makes you feel the part, and sometimes that can be enough to quiet the self-doubt.
You've spent years developing your craft. Is there anything you have found particularly useful on your journey?
One thing I found particularly helpful was the early modules during the Ultimate Novel Writing Course about plotting. I’ve never been a strong plotter (which is code for I HATE PLOTTING), usually pantsing my way through manuscripts with a vague outline of where I wanted to go. For me, that kept writing exciting.
The UNWC encouraged me to create a plot outline, encompassing three different acts, and I actually found it really helpful this time. I’d never go as far as to say I’m a plotter now, but maybe a reluctant plantser. I am definitely going to apply those skills (as well as the chapter breakdown and plotting sheets!) to the next manuscript I write.
Another thing I did differently for The Crafter’s Wife is I started with my cover letter. Which sounds a bit mad, I know – but having that short paragraph where I nailed the essence of what I wanted the story to be helped massively during drafting. Whenever I felt the story slipping or meandering, I would re-read the cover letter, re-align myself with what I wanted to achieve, and that gave me direction.
After having spent years writing and re-writing the same story, spending infinite amounts of time with your characters, and waking up sporadically in the middle of the night with ideas – how did you know it was time to submit?
I don’t know that you ever truly know it’s time. I think you just get so mind-boggled with your own story and words that the thought of editing for another minute just feels so repulsive that you know it’s time! And I say this as someone who’s favourite part of the writing process is editing. I love editing. To me, drafting is like making a giant mound of sand, and editing is sculpting it into a castle. It’s the bit where you add the beauty, for me at least. So when I can’t bear the thought of staring at my words a moment longer, I know it’s time.
We love asking our writers for one piece of advice they wish they knew at the beginning of their journey. If you could go back, what would you tell your past self?
Take your time. Make decisions with care. If you truly want this to be your journey – and hopefully one day a real career – it’s worth taking however much time you need to make these important decisions.
John is actually my second agent – I have been previously agented before. She was a genuinely lovely person, but not the right fit for my work, which I now know with hindsight. I rushed my first decision and made silly choices because I was excited and scared of losing the offer I had. Now, I know it’s okay to value myself in the process and take the time I need. We are all equals in this process – even though sometimes the power balance feels off.
Thank you so much for joining us Dani! We can't wait to see where your journey takes you next.
Calling all short story writers! We’ve pulled together a list of short story competitions, awards and prizes for you to have on your radar. To the best of our knowledge, these competitions run every year, but do make sure to check with each of them directly for everything you need to know before submitting your work.
Short Story Competitions.
Aesthetica Creative Writing Award
This competition is run by the prestigious art magazine every year, writers can enter short stories up to 2,000 words. Find out more here.
Anthology Short Story Competition
Anthology Short Story Competition is open to original and previously unpublished short stories in the English language by a writer of any nationality, living anywhere in the world. There is no restriction on theme or style. Stories submitted must not exceed the maximum of 1,500 words. Get all the details here.
Bath Short Story Award
Launched in 2012 the International Bath Short Story Award has rapidly become established as one of the prominent short story competitions in the UK receiving over fifteen hundred world-wide entries each year and producing a yearly anthology of short-listed and winning authors. Head to their website to find out everything you need to know.
BBC National Short Story Award
This prize is run yearly and only open to authors with a prior record of publishing creative work in the UK. Stories up to 8,000 words are accepted and may be submitted by the author or by their agent. Shortlisted stories are awarded a prize of £600. Get the full details here.
Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize
Run by the well-known and beloved London bookshop, the Brick Lane Bookshop Short Story Prize welcomes entries of original short fiction between 1000 and 5000 words. The winner will receive £1,000 and 12 shortlisted writers will be included in an anthology. Find out more here.
Bridport Short Story Competition
With one of the largest cash prizes for a short story competition, the Bridport Short Story prize has helped many writers launch careers and achieve success. Details here.
Creators of Justice Literary Awards
The Creators of Justice Literary Awards is an annual, international contest featuring works which highlight the struggle for human rights and social justice across the world. Writers can submit one poem, essay, or short story on an annual theme. More here.
Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction
Run by indie publisher Comma Press, this prize is open to both published and unpublished writers and aims to seek out the best established and up and coming voices in the form. Find out everything you need to know here.
Inclusive Voices Short Story Competition
A unique competition, the Inclusive Voices Short Story Competition asks writers for stories up to 550 words and 'should feature a character with a print disability' which aligns with their mission as a charity who have been providing audiobooks to people who struggle to read print for fifty years. More here.
Mairtín Crawford Awards
For the Mairtín Crawford Awards, both published and unpublished writers are invited to submit a short story of up to 2,500 words for the short story award, with the only stipulation being that they have not yet published a full collection of poetry, short stories, or a novel. Details here.
Manchester Fiction Prize
The Manchester Fiction Prize is open internationally to anyone aged 16 or over (there is no upper age limit) and awards a cash prize of £10,000 to the writer of the best short story submitted.
Mogford Prize for Food and Drink Writing
A unique competition, the Mogford Prize for Food and Drink Writing is an annual short story competition open to writers across the globe. The prize awards £10,000 to the best short story that has food and drink at its heart. Head to their website to find out more.
Mslexia's Short Story Competition
Run by the magazine for women-writers, Mslexia's annual competition is for unpublished complete short fiction of up to 3,000 words. Get the full details here.
Rhys Davies Short Story Competition
The Rhys Davies Short Story Competition is a distinguished national writing competition for writers born or living in Wales. The first prize is £1,000 and publication in a short story anthology to be published by Parthian Books. More here.
Seán Ó Faoláin International Short Story Competition
The competition is open to original, unpublished and un-broadcast short stories in the English language of 3,000 words or fewer. The story can be on any subject, in any style, by a writer of any nationality, living anywhere in the world. Winner gets €2,000, featured reading at the Cork International Short Story Festival (with four-night hotel stay and full board) and publication in Southword. Find out more here.
The Aurora Prize for Writing
The Aurora Prize is a national writing competition, seeking outstanding new writing in short fiction and poetry run by Writing East Midlands. More here.
The Bedford Competition
Open internationally, there are prizes totalling £4,600 and all winning and shortlisted stories and poems are published as an anthology.
The Bristol Short Story Prize
This is an annual international writing competition open to all published and unpublished, UK and non-UK-based writers.
The Commonwealth Short Story Prize
The prize is open to all Commonwealth citizens aged 18 and over entering a story of between 2,500 and 5,000 words. The regional winners receive £2,500 and the overall winner receives a total of £5,000. The winning stories are published online by Granta and in a special print collection by Paper + Ink.
The Galley Beggar Press Short Story Prize
Galley Beggar Press' mission is to 'support talented new writers, and to demonstrate the wonderful things that can be done with the short story form.' Writers supported by the indie publisher's short story prize have gone on to achieve amazing things, such as signing with agents and securing book deals as a result of taking part in the prize. Galley Beggar Press have added that their 'winners have been profiled in the Bookseller, the Irish Times, Guardian and elsewhere.' Co-run by one of our brilliant Ultimate Novel Writing Course tutors Sam Jordison, we're big fans of this prize. Get more details about the prize here.
The Moth Prizes
The Moth Magazine runs an annual short story prize open to anyone from anywhere in the world, as long as their writing is original and previously unpublished. Details here.
The Royal Society of Literature V. S. Pritchett Short Story Prize
The annual prize of £1,000 goes to the best unpublished short story of the year. The winning entry is also published in Prospect magazine and the RSL Review. Check their website for more information.
The Society of Authors' Awards
The Society of Authors runs annual awards, which are open to writers at all stages of their careers. Among them is The ALCS Tom-Gallon Trust Award for a short story (applicants need to have had at least one short story accepted for publication); and The McKitterick Prize, which is given annually to an author over the age of 40 for a first novel, published or unpublished. All details here.
Here are our top tips for entering writing competitions.
Write, write, write. Then put your writing away in a drawer.
Time spent away from your story can give you a chance to return with fresh eyes. This is crucial as it allows you to see the story the way a reader will. The next best thing is to...
Share your writing with a trusted writer friend.
We say 'writer' friend and not friends or family for a reason: constructive criticism is what you need most before you send your work out into the world. Sharing your story with someone who cares about you (and might not be a writer themselves) might only elicit good feedback. It's great to have a nurturing support system, but at this stage, you want to focus on making your writing as good as it can be.
Once you have submitted your work, follow any suggestions the competition might have.
This could mean adding their email address to your contacts so any emails from them won't be sent to spam or it could be making a note of key upcoming dates. Some competitions require longlisted and shortlisted writers to send additional words if they reach the next round.
Before you submit your work to a writing competition, make sure you have checked the following.
The competition deadline.
Competitions typically have strict deadlines to submit your work, make sure to put a reminder in your diary so you don't miss out.
The submission guidelines.
Competitions tend to have specific guidance on how to enter your work. Read them carefully and make sure to follow the rules as detailed. Remember, if you have any questions, the competitions are usually happy to answer them, assuming you have left plenty of time before the deadline.
The terms and conditions of entry.
Competitions will have stipulations around who can enter, make sure you've checked you are eligible before potentially wasting time submitting and/or entry free.
That's it from us, if you do enter any of these competitions we wish you the very best of luck.
After attending our Festival of Writing, Jo walked away the winner of our Friday Night Live competition and an agented writer! After publishing several books, we caught up with Jo to take a trip down memory lane.
Hi Jo, thank you so much for taking the time to chat to us. Since joining us on the festival stage, winning the Friday Night Live competition and meeting your now agent, you’ve published three books. Can you take us back to that night and tell us a little bit about your experience?
It feels like such a long time ago! I’d heard Joanna Cannon talk about winning Friday Night Live and how it launched her career, and that inspired me to have a go but, ten days before the festival, I was rushed into hospital for abdominal surgery and told not to travel, but it was such a great opportunity that I ignored all medical advice (I don’t advise this, folks). I was shortlisted for Best Opening Chapter and Friday Night Live, and you can’t turn down a chance like that!
I was so nervous that I was sick before going up on stage. I knew absolutely no one there and was in a fair amount of pain, but everyone was so lovely and supportive that I came away from that night with a new writing group, many friends - and an agent!
What a whirlwind! How did your writing journey after winning Friday Night Live compare to beforehand?
I started writing the book that would become Sticks and Stones in February – seven months before Friday Night Live. I had no deadline and no expectations, and it was glorious! I must have done fifty drafts of my opening chapters because every time I got stuck, I went back and started at the beginning again, so I was really happy with the first third. It was the rest of it that was a problem!
Jo Jakeman's debut Sticks and Stones, published by Vintage
When I signed with my agent (the lovely Imogen Pelham) the ending was still pretty raw, so she helped me work out what I wanted to say. We went back and forth for about six months before she sent it out on submission to editors. Until winning Friday Night Live, my writing was all for me but, from then on, a team was involved – and they all had opinions. There were deadlines and it quickly went from a hobby to a job. I’m not complaining – it was exactly what I’d wanted – but I felt the pressure pretty quickly. I now look at it like I’m getting all this input so we can make the book the best it can be, but back then, I felt like I was clueless.
Do you have any advice for writers entering Friday Night Live (or indeed, any competition)?
Um, try not to have life-saving surgery in the days before the competition? Seriously, though, preparation is key. Make sure your work is of the highest quality possible. Seek advice from others. Take advantage of courses, read blogs, and practice in front of the mirror or the dog. I recorded myself doing the reading until I was comfortable looking up from my cards long enough to engage with the audience.
The London Festival of Writing 2023's panel of literary agents.
As you were developing your craft, was there anything you found particularly useful on your journey?
Goodness, so much. For years I wrote in the metaphorical wilderness with a handful of books on writing. I didn’t let anyone else read my work, I just plodded on. It all changed for me when I started to engage in writing courses and share my work with others. I went to talks by authors and volunteered at my local book festival so I could breathe in the rarefied air of my favourite writers. I soaked up everything they had to say. Surrounding yourself with others who share your excitement for books and writing is invaluable.
Were there any surprises along the way? Or perhaps anything you wished you had known earlier, or been prepared for?
I wish I’d understood the publishing process better. Or, at all. When my first book came out I felt like an observer. I didn’t know what to expect or how much I could ask for. I assumed that everyone else knew better than me, so I accepted all of the proof-reader's extra commas and didn’t push back at titles and book covers I didn’t like. I was so grateful for the opportunity that sometimes I forgot that my opinions were valid.
You need a certain amount of knowledge to be comfortable enough to stand your ground. Now I know enough to say, ‘How about we try it this way?’ I lost my confidence a few years back (Covid, poor book sales, changing publishers). I had to remind myself why I write and rediscover my love for it. Honestly, I could talk for hours about this, but I won’t bore you here. I’ll just say that confidence in yourself, and your writing, is the key!
Now you’ve been published, is there any advice you would give aspiring authors? Or anything you might have done differently in your journey up to now?
Never stop learning, questioning and observing. Read the books, listen to the podcasts, take a course. I’m currently doing an MA in writing for Script and Screen and I am learning so much that will affect the way I write – and structure - books. As I mentioned in my previous answer, confidence is key. The more knowledge and experience you have the easier it is for you feel assured in your writing. The reader needs to feel that they are in safe hands.
Thank you so much Jo, can you let us know what are you working on right now?
One Bad Apple is coming out on 19th September 2024. It’s a slight change in direction for me. It's less psychological suspense and more of a straight-up whodunnit about the murder of a headmaster at a prestigious boys’ school. Writing about pushy, competitive parents with secrets to hide and reputations to uphold has been so much fun.
I’m currently finishing my edits for The Vanishing Act, which will be released in September 2025. I can’t say much about that yet, but I am very proud of this one and loved writing it.
Have you heard? Innovative digital-first publishers are changing the landscape of the industry. Any savvy writer on the lookout for a way to get their books into the hands of readers would benefit from keeping their eye on this exciting new frontier. We've put together everything you need to know about digital-first publishing, including which publishers are accepting submissions.
What is a digital publisher?
A digital publisher is a publisher like any other, but they tend to bring books to market in purely digital formats, like eBooks and audiobooks.
A digital-first publisher works slightly differently. Whilst they tend to prioritise digital formats, they also publish books in physical formats such as hardbacks and paperbacks.
What's the difference between a digital-first publisher and a traditional publisher?
The clue is in the name! A traditional publisher (like one of the Big Four: Penguin, Hachette, HarperCollins and MacMillan) tend to prioritise publishing a book in a physical format (like a hardback or a paperback) over other formats, though there is usually a variety of formats available for each of their titles titles.
The important word here is prioritise. Ask any published author and they'll tell you that marketing and publicity can be instrumental in a book's success. While a traditional publisher might put their efforts into selling physical copies, there are other successful ways publishers sell books.
Digital-first publishers prioritise selling digital formats (which have grown in popularity in recent years, especially in certain genres), this means their business model is slightly different to what a trade publisher usually offers their authors.
There is no one size fits all approach and it's important for authors to be well-informed of the options available to them.
If we take a step back from the nuts and bolts of the industry's inner workings, you'll find that digital-first publishers aren't that different to traditional publishers! In many cases, pre-conceptions about traditional publishing being the more enticing option for authors are often disproved when talking to digital-first published authors about their experience.
What are the benefits to working with a digital-first publisher?
In short, there are many! If you care about reaching readers, removing barriers that prevent them from getting your book into their hands and the business of book-selling is important to you: digital-first publishing is worth your consideration.
For one, digital-first publishers tend to be more open to unsolicited submissions from un-agented authors. That means you don't need to be represented by a literary agent to send them your submission! However, many still accept submissions from agents on behalf of their writers. It's worth noting that a small number of the digital-first publishers we found were only accepting submissions from agents, but this doesn't seem to be the norm.
To dig deeper into the benefits of working with a digital-first publisher, we thought we'd let author and our very own Head of Membership Becca Day talk about her experience being published by Embla, a digital-first imprint of Bonnier Books. Turns out, one of the main benefits is how their fresh approach invests in their authors' careers.
'The digital first strategy focuses on building your audience. My books were listed as 99p eBooks that were FREE for anyone with Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime. That’s a lot of people getting my books for free. But you know what? I still got paid. The way Kindle Unlimited and Prime Reading works is you get paid a (tiny) amount per page read. While the pay per page is tiny, the amount of people you can reach with a publisher who knows what they’re doing is not. Digital first publishers are typically much more ‘on it’ when it comes to advertising, and they have a much bigger budget for advertising because they’re not wasting it on printing costs. My debut has now been read by nearly 1 million people. How NUTS is that? 1 million x a tiny amount = a substantial paycheck.' - Becca Day, author of THE SECRETS WE BURIED
But, what if you still want your books to be published in physical formats - and end up in bookshops?
That is an understandable goal, one that many authors share, Becca included. The good news is, Becca's books are published in multiple formats, including paperback. Let's hear what she has to say about it...
'The reason I suggest digital-first publishing to debut authors is because it’s the perfect jumping off point. It’s a way to build your audience and your readership so that when your books do eventually get into bookstores and you do eventually move to that more traditional publishing model (it took me three books to do it, but I got there) you’ll have that audience who know you and are willing to spend the money to get a hard copy.'
'And you know what? My books are now in bookstores and I still don’t make nearly as much from paperbacks as I do from eBooks. Not even close. The world is changing.'
These quotes were taken from a blog post Becca wrote about her experience of digital-first publishing, read it in full here.
Vanity Publishers and Hybrid Publishers
We should probably also include a note about vanity publishers. These guys are the snakes and serpents of publishing. They essentially pretend to be a real publishing company contemplating the commercial publication of your book. Inevitably, however, you’ll be told that the “editorial board” or something other fictional entity decided they couldn’t quite afford the risk of going it alone. So you’ll be invited to spend some quite large sum of money on “partnership publishing”, or something like that. If it smells bad, it is bad. Just say no – with emphasis. If you feel like adding a cuss-word or two when you say so, then we won’t be offended
Hybrid publishers are a somewhat cleaner version of the same thing. They’ll ask for money to get you published, but be more candid about likely outcomes. If you encounter honesty and openness, the publisher may well be trustworthy. If you encounter heavy selling and a lack of candour, then avoid, avoid, avoid.
How can I find a digital-publisher?
Drum roll please... We've pulled together a list of active, reputable digital-first publishers. We've included as much key information as possible about each publisher, from what they publish to whether they accept submissions from un-agented writers, but please be aware that this information is only accurate at the time of writing. Make sure to check with the publisher directly if you have any specific queries about their submission process.
Digital-first publishers
Below, we've shared a variety of reputable and thriving digital-first publishers. Whilst this list is accurate at time of writing this article, we're sure more and more will pop up in the future. If you do spot a new digital-first publisher, let us know by sending us an email. Don't forget, before you trust any publisher with your submission, make sure to read our guide on how to spot vanity publishers and hybrid publishers.
Got it? Great! Let's dig into some digital-first publishers. All of the following tend to publish general fiction (which means they cover most genres) but be sure to check out their websites for specific details about their titles and their submission guidelines.
Boldwood
Boldwood are one of the most exciting digital-first publishers in the industry. We were lucky enough to be joined by Nia Beynon from Boldwood Books for our Ask A Publisher Anything event. Premium Members can catch up on the replay now. Not a Premium Member?Join nowand get access to masterclasses, events, video courses, AgentMatch and so much more.
Boldwood accept submissions during specific windows, so make sure to follow them on social media or check their website for any future openings. They publish commercial fiction in all sorts of genres.
Avon
A commercial fiction division of HarperCollins, Avon publish across multiple genres and often with a digital-first approach. We can't find their submission details, but we think it's likely they only accept agented submissions. We did find a handy Author Testimonial page on their website that is worth checking out if you are interested in being published by Avon.
Bookouture
Bookouture is another leading digital-first publisher making change in the industry. We love that they cover most genres in commercial fiction and that their submission guidelines are super clear and easy to follow. Find out more here.
Embla
Embla publishes our very own Head of Membership Becca Day and so they hold a special place in our hearts. They specialise in commercial adult fiction, covering thrillers like Becca's and compelling stories across all popular genres. Head to their website for more.
Hera
The publisher of our Managing Director Sophie Flynn! Another publisher dear to us at Jericho Writers. Hera specialise in crime and thrillers, romance and sagas, but they publish most popular genres. Agented and un-agented writers can submit to them directly, more details on their website.
HQ Digital
HG Digital are a leading digital-first imprint of HarperCollins, publishing commercial fiction. We believe HQ Digital accept submissions from un-agented writers. Keep an eye on their submissions page for updates.
Joffe Books
Joffe are an independent digital-first publisher that boasts bestsellers. They publish across all general fiction genres, but specialise in crime and mysteries. Joffe kindly joined us for a panel event that Premium Members can rewatch here. Joffe accept submissions from un-agented writers, find out more here.
One More Chapter
A digital-first imprint of HarperCollins, One More Chapter publish 'page-turning' fiction across most genres and accept submissions from un-agented writers. Find out more about their submission guidelines here.
Orion Dash
Orion Dash is a digital-first imprint at Orion, part of Hachette. They publish commercial fiction and in their submission guidelines specifically mention that they are looking for women’s fiction, romance, saga, historical, crime and thrillers. Head over to their website for more information.
Digital-first publishers by genre
It's no secret that certain genres seem to thrive in digital spaces. We've compiled digital-first publishers that specialise in their chosen genres.
Crime and Thrillers
Many of the biggest and most prolific digital-first publishers we've already mentioned specialise in crime and thrillers, even if their list of titles spans all genres. We recommend scrolling back up this page and checking out the digital-first publishers listed above.
Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Speculative Fiction
Speculative fiction is another area of the market that seems to perform well digitally. If you're writing sci-fi, fantasy or anything speculative, consider submitting your manuscript to one of these publishers:
Baen - an independent digital-first publisher of sci-fi and fantasy books. Accepting submissions from un-agented authors, find out more about their submission guidelines here.
Berkley - during a recent open submissions call (in 2024), Berkley included romantasy in the genres they were looking for. We recommend keeping an eye on their website and following them on social media for information about how to submit to them.
DAW Books - an imprint of Astra, DAW publishes widely across the sci-fi and fantasy genres, they also mention on their website that they aim 'to publish a wide range of voices and stories, because we believe that it is the duty of the science fiction and fantasy genres to be inclusive and representative of as many diverse viewpoints as possible.' We can't find details on how to submit to DAW at this time, which leads us to believe they accept submissions through agents only.
Solaris Nova - an imprint of Rebellion publishing, Solaris Nova have detailed guidance on what they are looking for in their open submissions. As well as accepting sci-fi and fantasy, they are also looking for horror submissions!
Romance
Romance is booming in digital spaces, whether it's on BookTok or in the Amazon Kindle charts, so it's no surprise to see so many digital-first publishers specialising in this genre. As one of the most popular genres out there, devout are always on the hunt for the next sweeping love story, and digital formats allow them to find new books in an instant. If you're a romance writer, don't discount working with these publishers.
Carina Press - Harlequin's digital-first imprint accepts both agented and un-agented submissions. From their clear submission guidelines, we can see that in rare circumstances, they will also consider previously self-published works.
Entice - publisher of BookTok romantasy hit Fourth Wing, Entice clearly have the power to help a book become an overnight hit. Unfortunately, at time of writing, they do not accept submissions from un-agented writers.
Evernight Publishing - specialising in romance and erotica, Evernight Publishing accept submissions from all writers. Bonus points for clearly stating their submission preferences.
Forever Yours - an imprint of Hachette, Forever Yours impressed us with their clear submission guidelines. They accept submissions from both agented and un-agented writers.
Mills & Boon - a staple in the romance space! The iconic Mills & Boon seem active in their search of new and un-agented writers to work with.
SMP Swerve - whilst this publisher specialises in romance fiction, at the time of writing, we couldn't find specific details on how to submit to them but we believe they only accept submissions from agented authors.
How do I submit to a digital-first publisher?
Usually, digital-first publishers ask for the same materials you would expect a literary agent to request in a submission. These are typically the opening section of your manuscript (up to a certain number of words, pages or chapters), a synopsis and query letter. Some might forgo the query letter and instead ask you to complete a form and include your information.
When can I expect to hear back from a digital-first publisher with the results of your submission?
It's difficult to say - but within the digital-first publisher's submission guidelines they usually offer a rough estimate of how long it takes for them to respond to submissions. If that time has elapsed since you have submitted to them (and you've double checked your email inbox and spam folder!) then reaching out is usually acceptable. We recommend keeping in mind that open submissions tend to be popular and it can take a considerable amount of time for editors to read, and make a judgement, on the submissions they receive.
Disclaimer: this article seeks to compile information for writers interested in digital publishing. We do not have direct affiliations nor do we endorse any publishers mentioned in this article. If you have experience working with any digital-first publisher and would like to share this with us, or if you think we've missed out a digital-publisher, please send an email to info@jerichowriters.com. We'd love to hear from you.
Come on a journey with me back in time five years. I had just sat down to write my first novel (note – not the one I ended up getting published as my debut) and I was daydreaming, as you do, about the day I’d see my book in a bookstore.
Little did I know that publishing had other ideas for me. The book deal I would end up signing would not see my debut proudly displayed in the windows of my favourite bookstores. It wouldn’t take me on a tour across the country doing signings. It wouldn’t even involve the ability to sell my books at a launch party. That’s because I signed a digital first publishing deal.
What is digital first publishing?
There are lots of digital first publishers. In fact, more and more are springing up every month (and with good reason – but we’ll touch on that in a bit). Often, they are smaller ‘imprints’ of a larger publisher. Mine, for example, is called Embla Books, and it is a smaller imprint of the much bigger publisher Bonnier Books. What sets these smaller imprints apart is their main focus is on the digital world – eBooks and audiobooks. So, when I signed my book deal, I was entering into an agreement that, though they would produce my book in paperback via Print-On-Demand (AKA the book only gets printed when it’s ordered – there are no copies sitting in a warehouse somewhere like with a traditional publisher), the primary focus would be the eBook and the audiobook. This meant all those typical release activities I had expected from being a published author just didn’t happen.
Ugh. That sounds awful. Why would anyone want to go with a digital-first publisher?
If you’re sitting there thinking that, I wouldn’t blame you. I, too, felt a little let-down by the whole thing when I first started. I thought I was settling. Like perhaps I wasn’t good enough to get the window displays and the book tours and all of those lovely writerly things. What I didn’t realise in those early days when I felt like I was just playing pretend at being an author was that it would turn out to be the best business decision I could possibly have made.
Digital first is where the money is at.
Now, I’m not raking in millions as an author. Clearly. I’m still working full-time! However, I’ve undoubtedly earned more than I would have if I had gone down a more ‘traditional’ route of publication. The trouble with those deals is, unless you’re one of the magical unicorn lead titles who get all the publicity, you’re highly unlikely to make any decent money off of physical books. The reason for this is simple – people tend to only buy physical books from authors they already know and like. Because why? Because money.
The digital first strategy focuses on building your audience. My books were listed as 99p eBooks that were FREE for anyone with Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime. That’s a lot of people getting my books for free. But you know what? I still got paid. The way Kindle Unlimited and Prime Reading works is you get paid a (tiny) amount per page read. While the pay per page is tiny, the amount of people you can reach with a publisher who knows what they’re doing is not. Digital first publishers are typically much more ‘on it’ when it comes to advertising, and they have a much bigger budget for advertising because they’re not wasting it on printing costs. My debut has now been read by nearly 1 million people. How NUTS is that? 1 million x a tiny amount = a substantial paycheck.
Okay but… I still want my books in bookstores.
I know, I know. Me too. The good news is, now my books are. The reason I suggest digital-first publishing to debut authors is because it’s the perfect jumping off point. It’s a way to build your audience and your readership so that when your books do eventually get into bookstores and you do eventually move to that more traditional publishing model (it took me three books to do it, but I got there) you’ll have that audience who know you and are willing to spend the money to get a hard copy.
And you know what? My books are now in bookstores and I still don’t make nearly as much from paperbacks as I do from eBooks. Not even close. The world is changing.
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If you want to know more about digital first publishing, why not watch the replay of our Ask A Publisher Anything event with Nia Beynon from Boldwood Books. They’re another digital first publisher that are absolutely storming the bestseller lists right now, so Nia is the best person hear talk about this exciting area of publishing.
This replay is available to Premium Members as part of our Masterclass library. Not a Premium Member?Join nowand get access to masterclasses, events, video courses, AgentMatch and so much more.
With an impressive background in the finance world, Nuala's TUNE IN is a practical guide on how to make decisions in an increasingly chaotic world. We caught up with Nuala to chat all about her writing journey from first draft through to becoming a bestseller. Complete with new directions, lessons learned along the way and a little help along the way from one of our editors, this is the story of how TUNE IN was published...
As a former Chief Marketing Officer in the investment industry, I went back to school after 30 years and did a MSc in Behavioural Science at the London School of Economics. Although I always thought I would write a book, being able to make sense of the psychology of decision-making and apply it to real-world situations was the catalyst.
I think it’s easier to get decisions right and avoid regret than we think - and when we hold power, it’s an obligation to do so. As I sit on boards that span sport and non-profits, I see misjudgement impact people’s lives, I wanted to apply behavioural insights to set people up for success and provide a simple framework to prevent error.
What is TUNE IN about and why is it different?
Despite popular opinion, the most underestimated risk isn’t economic, technology or climate risk. It’s human decision risk, triggered by our tendency to tune out what really matters especially in high-stakes political or emotional situations – i.e. when we feel under pressure, crisis, conflict or uncertainty. I draw attention to a neglected source of misinformation which is ironically a source of opportunity.
I make the case that human decision risk is an underestimated source of misinformation but also a source of advantage and opportunity. Every day we hear less and misjudge more. TUNE IN explores the rising threat of misjudgement and explains why so many feel unheard and tune out who or what really matters. I introduce a practical framework of ten traps to avoid regret and prevent error.
Can you tell us a little bit about the process your book went through from writing the first draft, through to publication?
I wrote the first draft of TUNE IN initially and looked for an agent and publisher. The final product was vastly different of course as the idea took a slightly different direction. I think this is the case whether fiction or non-fiction. The agent search was tough as mostly focused on fiction rather than non-fiction so I engaged Jericho Writers to help refine the pitch. I eventually went direct to a publisher and secured a deal with Harriman House, an imprint of Macmillan. Then, I worked with a wonderful Jericho Writers manuscript editor. This was helpful before I submitted my first version to the publishers. From there, I had three different editors. I found all varied in terms of their focus, interest and attention to detail but together the product was enhanced. My final editor was especially patient interested in the topic, allowing more last-minute changes than I thought possible. Finally I pressed the send button in Dubai. And TUNE IN was born!
Is there anything you found particularly useful on your journey?
The process is a lot harder than it looks and can be really off-putting. I had read a book on how to make a pitch and found that incredibly useful as full of samples. I also scoured existing books to find agents from other authors. I found that made little difference as psychologically they compared you. The fact that I was in the Jericho Writers community was terrific for a debut non-fiction author. Scribes was also a very good resource for first-time authors which helped TUNE IN. By far the resource I valued most at this early stage was an editor who gave excellent directional feedback and confidence to keep going.
Were there any surprises along the way? Or perhaps anything you wished you had known earlier, or been prepared for?
I underestimated how much marketing the author needs to do for launch and thereafter; and how you can’t rely on publishers alone. It also costs. Part of this process requires securing endorsements which is very time-consuming. For TUNE IN, I secured 14 phenomenal endorsements from across business, sport, academia and even an FBI Investigator, including some well-known individuals who were extremely generous in their praise. I think it’s worth the effort to do this even though you’re getting tired, and it feels like a luxury.
What advice would you give to writers working on their first draft?
I had surprises throughout! I don’t think my idea was articulated sharply enough when I first approached agents. Now I think I know what they want. I tried to cover too much in an area people think they’re good at already. For the first draft, I would structure it better and also write the elevator speech. It focuses the mind better. I think it’s important to write the PR pitch in the beginning. If its not strong enough, don’t write at all as it will go nowhere.
After having spent years working on your book – how did you know it was time to submit?
I had a deadline, so I had no choice about when to submit. That said, once I was excited about the message and the fantastic breadth of stories, that was a signal that TUNE IN was good enough to submit. I had incorporated a lot of real-life characters that made it interesting, pacy and relevant. Most people now comment on the vast range of examples and are pleasantly surprised at the number of current industries and professions covered. I think I will enjoy listening to this again - with so many facts and stories to make a serious point, I need to remember them all now too!
Can you let us know what are you working on now?
Within the first few days, TUNE IN was an Amazon #1 new release in six different categories, the most wished for and a top three bestseller in three categories. Of course, this changes regularly and can still get better or worse. I am now having a holiday then focusing on gathering reviews and spreading the word – this is the next stage of the journey!
We were thrilled to hear that Samuel Burr's debut had found a home with Orion books. We caught up with Premium Member and now Sunday Times bestselling author, to hear all about his writing journey so far.
Hi Samuel, congratulations on the publication of The Fellowship of Puzzlemakers! You've had a whirlwind writing journey that includes being a part of our community but also writing for TV, and now having your debut novel come out. Can you tell us a little bit about how you got here?
Thank you! It’s been a mad few years, but I’m thrilled to finally be sharing my Puzzlemakers with the world! Ever since I started dipping my toes into the world of novel writing, I’ve tried to embed myself into as many writing communities as I can - not least for the brilliant resources that are so widely available, but also to build my network and make friends with fellow writers. Writing a novel is no mean feat and it’s also a very solitary pastime, so having people to lean on for help and support is totally invaluable. Jericho Writers has been a brilliant for that.
I started writing my debut at the Faber Academy, having previously completed an online course with Curtis Brown Creative, but I realised quite quickly after graduating from Faber (and securing an agent) that I wasn’t done learning! In fact, I was hungry to continue developing my craft, and to meet more writers! So that’s when I joined Jericho Writers as a Premium Member, whilst editing Puzzlemakers, which ended up selling in an auction in Feb 2022. It’s being translated in 14 languages around the world, which is something I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to get my head around!
My role in television involved devising, developing and selling new unscripted TV formats, so I’ve always been someone full of ideas. During my career I’ve also learnt to develop my pitching skills. I understand that the most sellable ideas can be pitched in just a few lines, and so I've honed the Fellowship of Puzzlemakers elevator pitch over and over!
We’re thrilled to have been part of your journey, and, we’re always keen to talk elevator pitches. They are so tricky, but once you’ve nailed your book’s concept, they can be a secret weapon. If you’re up for it, could you share your pitch with us? (And anyone who isn’t familiar with The Fellowship of Puzzlemakers).
Of course! It’s the story of Clayton Stumper - a young man who is a bit of a young fogey. Clay dresses like your grandad and drinks sherry like your aunt. At 25 years of age, he finds himself as one of the surviving members of a very British institution. The Fellowship is a retirement community made up of some of the smartest minds in the country and it’s where he was abandoned at birth. Among the residents are a mazemaker, a quiz setter, and a jigsaw artist to name just a few.
But there’s a mystery at the heart of the Fellowship…. a puzzle that’s yet to be solved…. and that’s how Clayton came to be there, and where he came from.
When the founder of the Fellowship – an esteemed cruciverbalist (or a crossword compiler) called Pippa Allsbrook passes away, she bequeaths her final puzzle to the young man she’s raised as her own. And so, we follow Clayton on a quest, as he pieces together the clues of his past, and finds himself at the same time.
At its heart, it’s a story about young man finding his place in the world. But it is also a celebration of the wisdom of age and the friendships that can exist between the old and young.
We know how much a manuscript can transform during the process of writing the first draft through to publication, what was that process like for The Fellowship of Puzzlemakers?
As one of my characters points out in the book, ‘…nothing worth solving is ever easy…’ and it was no exception with this book. I think editing any novel is a bit of a puzzle in itself – trying to work out where all the parts belong, searching for missing holes to fill in. I suppose what made my novel particularly challenging to write (and specifically to edit) were the interactive elements embedded into the story. I knew I wanted to feature actual puzzles within the text for readers to solve – to make it a book you can read and play. After countless revisions and tweaks we finally got there! But it was anything but easy!
Were there any surprises along the way? Or perhaps anything you wished you had known earlier, or been prepared for?
Adapting the text for the audiobook was another very unique challenge as you obviously can’t see the puzzles while listening, but I’m thrilled with how it’s turned out. I think that’s something that doesn’t really cross your mind when you’re writing, at least it didn’t for me. It was only after signing the deal that I realised we’d be making an audio version of the book and that’s when I had to put my thinking cap on! I must say, our readers Dame Penelope Keith and Russell Tovey are just perfect and it’s a fantastic listen!
You were developing your craft for several years before you were published, is there anything you found particularly useful on your journey?
I’m always impressed by how many brilliant resources there are out there for aspiring writers. I benefitted hugely from plugging into the community as quickly as I could. Coming from television, I didn’t really know anyone in books, so I knew I needed to build my network of contacts in the same way I had done in TV. I attended countless events – in real life and virtually – signed up for courses, followed my favourite writers on socials, as well as the big influencers, publishing houses etc, just so I could understand how the industry worked, learn from other people’s experiences, and build my own writing tribe. It’s been completely invaluable, particularly in the run-up to publication. I’m so lucky to have people cheering me on, helping to spread the word. Of course, I’m now keen to pay it forward and do the same for other debut writers.
After spending so long writing and re-writing the same story, spending infinite amounts of time with your characters – how did you know it was time to submit?
It’s so difficult to know! Someone once told me a book is never finished, but it is ready, and I found that immensely helpful. I think by the time my agent and I were going out on submission I had reached a point where I knew I couldn’t continue without the input of someone else. I needed fresh eyes on it. I had done as much as I physically could with the story, honed every sentence countless times, and I felt proud of the story I’d created. I think that’s quite key. Are you comfortable sharing this with others? Do you feel good inside about it?
Do you have any advice for writers hoping to get published?
Nail your comp titles! I really think this is key. There is so much competition and agents are so overworked that you need to be able to say where your book might sit figuratively on a shelf. I always encourage people not to go too literally when coming up with comps. Think about the core elements of your book – its identifying features – and find other books that have similar touchstones. If you can’t think of any, you might have a problem. Selling a book that is entirely ‘unique’ (i.e. It can’t be compared to anything else in the market) makes it almost impossible to sell. Publishers can be risk averse so make it easier for them to say yes. Nail your comps!
Before we go, can you let us know what are you working on now?
I’m delighted to have the opportunity to write a second book with Orion Fiction, which is another standalone novel. While I can’t say too much at this point, I hope that anyone who has read and enjoyed The Fellowship of Puzzlemakers will also enjoy my second book. Nostalgic joy. That’s all I’m saying for now!
Hi, Jericho Writers here! This takeover originally featured in one of our email newsletters in 2022. Since then, Marve's career has sky-rocketed. After making the Friday Night Live final at our Festival of Writing, Marve went on to secure a three-book deal with Penguin. Take a walk down memory lane with us and enjoy Marve's advice on how to persevere as a writer...
Hi! I’m Marve, a writer and a recovering sore-loser. I wrote my first poem at eleven. It was NOT the best-written piece of work, but it helped me articulate the feelings I previously didn’t think had words. A couple of years later, I started writing a novel. I’m proud to say I wrote up to 10,000 words before losing my handwritten manuscript– four times! Why? Because I was so excited for anyone to read my work that I literally gifted it to them. It took me a decade to finish that book, but one thing remained the same - I still can’t wait for the world to read my work.
I pour my heart into every draft, so when my work isn’t the best thing my reader has ever read, the crash hits hard and burns fast! It’s an unrealistic want– somehow, it still hurts.
In 2017, I took a loan from my dad to publish my first novel and did all the marketing myself. I sold over 400 copies in the launch weekend and sold enough that month to pay back the loan (my dad is a banker, so he’s very by the books). In hindsight, that was pretty impressive for a 22-year-old - but a couple of years later, sales slowed to a near halt. Something wasn’t working and this sent me right into a writing slump for another couple of years.
It felt like an uphill battle with the saboteur in my head, and while I was terrified, I wasn’t ready to give up yet. So, earlier this year, I dared to write again, and later got a manuscript assessment report. The feedback was– amazing and unique story, but this draft needs a lot more work. Oh! The pain! This feedback hit harder because it was my first try after my writing slump, so in my head, I’m thinking – time to quit.
But now, I’m back, and that’s because I learned something that’s changed my mindset. I learned to embrace the 'sulk’. I’ve come to understand that it’s okay to be disappointed, to take as much ice cream as I need, and mindlessly rewatch Friends for the 200th time when things don’t go according to plan. This has been a real breakthrough for me because I've allowed myself the time to first, reflect and then do what was most important- move on. Moving on is much easier when you've grieved whatever disappointment or letdown you're dealing with. Whether it’s the 10th or 200th agent rejection, two years stuck on submissions, not getting that award you really wanted, or maybe it’s the sour words of a beta reader. Nothing is too big or small to feel bad about, but you must remember that the goal is to get moving. Allow yourself to feel the feelings. Take however long you need, then come back to the mission, ready to take on the world. At least, that’s what’s worked for me.
This year, I’ve had to be a lot braver. I applied to five competitions in one day, and got shortlisted for two, including Friday Night Live! Who’d have thought? Did I cry when I missed out on winning? Yes! Did I apply for more? Yes!
Now, my final draft is nearly clean enough for submission, and with five full manuscript requests, two partials and two editor requests, I feel like I'm much closer to getting an agent.
I’m also self-publishing again, and while I hope for a greater launch than the first one, nearly six years later, these old bones creak, and I wonder if I have the guts of a hopeful 22-year-old girl. We'll see.
The mission is to do it afraid. So, to you, I say, TRY, FAIL, SULK, MOVE ON!
We were thrilled to hear the news that long-time member of our community Saz Wilson recently self-published her first book Mad Dogs & Me: A Comedy Diary. To celebrate this fantastic milestone, we caught up with Saz to hear all about her journey from Premium Member to debut author.
Where did the idea for your book come from? What inspired you to write it?
In a moment of madness, I took on two giant Rhodesian Ridgeback puppies who turned my life upside down! Kiara was a menace to society and looked for trouble every second she was awake. Otis, her loyal brother, was her wingman and a serious sufferer of FOMO, so never wanted to miss out on an opportunity to join in with the shenanigans.
I would recount my daily tales of woe at school pick-up and the other mums would howl with laughter and I thought, I need to write this down! As I barely had time to take a bath, I recorded them on my phone’s voice notes instead. By lockdown I had over 300 entries and decided to turn them into a comedy diary.
Why did you choose to self-publish instead of seeking agency representation?
I used to work in film and TV and from personal experience knew that once you handed your work over to a production company, which in this case would be a publisher, you had very little control. I wanted the book to reflect my authentic voice and I knew the branding that I wanted for the cover and the website. I felt the only way to be truly happy with what I produced was to manage the whole process myself. I also thought self-publishing would be quicker than going the traditional route but with the first book, I’m not sure that’s true – there was so much to learn!
Photo taken at Saz Wilson's Mad Dogs & Me: A Comedy Diary Book Launch
What was your favourite thing about self-publishing?
I’m not going to lie, self-publishing to the equivalent standard of traditional publishing is really, really hard. I had no idea what I was getting into when I started! I think my favourite thing about self-publishing is that if it fails, it’s down to you but if it succeeds, it is also because of you! You have the final say on the edit, the cover, everything, and as the marketer you have to be proud of what you are selling. I loved the finished copy of my book and the feedback has been incredible.
What was the hardest part of self-publishing your book?
Where do I start?! All of it was hard if I’m honest. I think the two hardest parts were that most communication is online so when you’re trying to describe creative elements in detail, it’s done through messaging which is extremely frustrating. Things that should have taken weeks, took months because of this. The other thing was the amount of third party human error. Every time the book went off for editing, proof-reading, typesetting etc. the book would come back with errors that weren’t there before. You have to triple check your manuscript until your eyes bleed!
How did you find Jericho Writers helpful?
Jericho Writers was the reason I had the confidence to self-publish. I finished my manuscript almost two years ago and joined Jericho as a Premium Member immediately. I found the courses, live webinars and team of professionals invaluable. I also felt part of a community which is so important when you’re at home trying to figure all this out by yourself.
I worked with so many amazing people on the book who I found through Jericho. Anna Caig was incredible with the marketing and Debbie Young was invaluable with the book production. I had a list of questions as long as my arm, and Debbie knew the answers to every single one of them!
Photo taken at Saz Wilson's Mad Dogs & Me: A Comedy Diary Book Launch
What advice would you give to other authors looking to self-publish?
I would say join Jericho Writers as a Premium Member straight away. The amount of content you have access to is the biggest value for money in all the money you’ll spend, honestly. And I’m not just saying that because this is an interview with them! Check the acknowledgements at the back of my book – Jericho are the first people I thank!
I would also say really learn about the process, speak to other self-published authors and Take. Your. Time. Everything takes longer than you think and often it can be overwhelming and you need to take a break for a few days to get your head together. Having a mentor at any stage of the process is invaluable. I worked with a book coach when I was re-writing the manuscript and it helped me to meet deadlines and talk ideas through. The same when I was marketing and publishing. Courses are brilliant but can only take you so far – sometimes you need to talk to someone in the know when you’re stuck and want to chuck the towel in! It’s not cheap but it’s an investment in yourself and you won’t regret it. However, the biggest piece of advice I would give to any new author is stay true to your vision, it’s your book at the end of the day and you are the one who is going to be selling it.
Saz Wilson is the author of her first book Mad Dogs & Me: A Comedy Diary, a hilarious and moving real-life diary about a woman who’s bitten off more than she can chew by taking on two giant mad puppies.
Saz wrote the book to make people laugh and to raise enough money to open an animal sanctuary.
If you're interested in self-publishing, you can follow in Saz's footsteps and work with expert Debbie Young, check out the Simply Self-Publish course. You can find out more about the course here. We're accepting applications until 4 April, apply here.
If you've ever felt the thrill of following clues, the satisfaction of piecing together a complex puzzle, or the rush of adrenaline as you uncover a hidden truth, then you're in for a treat. Today, we're sharing some fun murder mystery story ideas to get those literary cogs turning and your creative juices flowing like a river of suspense. From classic whodunits to tales of the supernatural and mind-bending mysteries that defy time and space, where secrets are buried deep, motives lurk in the shadows, and the pursuit of justice keeps your heart racing, we’ve got it all covered.
Murder mysteries are like a puzzle waiting to be solved, a riddle itching to be unravelled, and a suspenseful rollercoaster ride that leaves you breathless. They're the literary gems that keep us up at night, eagerly flipping page after page, driven by that burning question: "Whodunit?" And now, it's your turn to become the mastermind behind the most mind-boggling and diabolical murder mystery stories that will captivate and mesmerize your readers.
Remember, these are just starting points. You can take inspiration from one or many of these ideas and work on fleshing them out with our book outline template.
What makes a good murder mystery story?
Before we dive headfirst into the treasure trove of murder mystery story ideas, let's unravel the essence of what makes these tales so utterly captivating.
A murder mystery is an intricate dance of clues and misdirection that challenges both the sleuth within us and the boundaries of our imagination. At its core, it's a narrative journey where a crime, most often a murder, becomes the focal point around which suspense, intrigue, and tension swirl. The heart of any compelling murder mystery lies in the pursuit of truth and justice, as we follow the footsteps of detectives, amateur sleuths, or even ordinary individuals thrust into extraordinary circumstances, all determined to uncover the secrets concealed within the shadows of a crime. So, as we explore a plethora of murder mystery story ideas, remember that these tales are not just about "whodunit" but also about the thrilling journey of unravelling the "why" and "how."
Where can you find ideas for murder mystery stories?
When it comes to finding inspiration for your murder mystery stories, ideas can be found absolutely anywhere. Here are just a few places where you can start looking:
Real-Life Crimes – Real life is often stranger than fiction! Draw inspiration from true crime stories, unsolved cases, or historical mysteries.
Local Legends and Urban Myths – Explore local folklore, urban legends, or mysterious occurrences in your area. These tales often contain elements ripe for a captivating murder mystery.
Character Quirks – Start with a unique character and build a story around their quirks, flaws, or hidden past. Characters can be both the heart of the mystery and the source of intrigue.
Exotic Settings - Transport your readers to intriguing and exotic locations, such as remote islands, ancient castles, or bustling cities, where secrets lurk in every corner. Often with a creepy or interesting setting comes a spark of an idea.
Historical Periods - Dive into a specific historical era or event and craft a murder mystery within that context. Historical details can add depth and richness to your story.
Unusual Murder Weapons - Think beyond the conventional and create mysteries with unconventional murder weapons, from poisoned desserts to deadly heirlooms.
Relationship Dynamics - Explore complex relationships like family feuds, love triangles, or business rivalries. Emotions and motives can be the driving force behind your murder mystery.
Unanswered Questions - Take inspiration from unanswered questions or loose ends in existing stories, history, or folklore. Fill in the gaps with your own imaginative twists.
Bizarre Phenomena - Consider unusual phenomena like paranormal events, time travel, or bizarre occurrences that challenge logic. These elements can add a unique twist to your murder mystery.
By drawing inspiration from these diverse sources, you can craft murder mystery stories that intrigue, surprise, and captivate your readers. The possibilities are endless, and your creative journey begins by exploring the mysteries that pique your interest the most.
Murder mystery story idea prompts
If that’s not enough to get your imagination going, I’ve put together some prompts for your writing. Feel free to add your own twist or mix them up. You’re only limited by your imagination.
1. "The Poisoned Pianist"
Imagine a world-class pianist in the midst of an epic concert. The lights dim, the audience holds its breath, and just as the final note is struck, the pianist collapses, poisoned! Who had access to the pianist's water bottle, and why would anyone want to silence this musical genius forever?
2. "The Haunting of Hollow Manor"
Set in a creepy, centuries-old mansion, a group of strangers gathers for a masquerade ball. Suddenly, the lights flicker, and a blood-curdling scream echoes through the halls. But when they find the victim, there's no one else in sight. Is the mansion really haunted, or is there a sinister plot afoot?
3. "The Time-Traveling Murderer"
In a small town known for its mysterious temporal anomalies, a murder occurs that defies all logic. The victim appears to have been killed with a weapon from the future, and the clues lead the detectives on a mind-bending journey through time itself.
4. "The Deadly Art Heist"
A world-renowned art collector's prized possession is stolen right from under his nose, but the thief is found dead at the scene. The collector insists it's a murder, not a robbery gone wrong. The question is, who wanted the artwork, and why was the thief silenced?
5. "The Circus of Secrets"
Under the big top of a traveling circus, a high-flying trapeze artist plummets to their death during a daring act. But was it truly an accident, or was there a web of jealousy and betrayal lurking behind the scenes of this colourful circus world?
6. "The Phantom of Penrose Park"
Penrose Park has long been rumoured to be haunted, but when a well-known ghost hunter meets an untimely demise during an investigation, the town is thrown into chaos. Did the ghost get revenge, or was there something more sinister hiding in the shadows?
7. "The Cryptic Cruise Conspiracy"
On a luxury cruise liner in the middle of the ocean, a wealthy passenger is found dead in their locked cabin. With no way on or off the ship, the killer must be among the guests and crew. But how did they commit the murder without leaving a trace?
8. "The Vanishing Village"
An entire village disappears overnight, leaving behind empty houses and abandoned possessions. But a lone survivor claims to have seen something that night – something otherworldly. Can investigators unravel the mystery of the vanishing village and the survivor's cryptic tale?
9. "The Enigmatic Lighthouse Murder"
Perched on a desolate island, a centuries-old lighthouse stands as a beacon of hope and mystery. When a lighthouse keeper is found dead at the top of the tower with the light extinguished, it's not just his life that's gone dark. As investigators arrive, they must contend with treacherous cliffs, relentless storms, and the eerie whispers of ghostly legends surrounding the lighthouse.
10. "The Culinary Conundrum at Gourmet Gardens"
In the heart of the culinary world, at the renowned Gourmet Gardens restaurant, a famous chef is found dead in the walk-in freezer, surrounded by a tantalizing array of frozen delicacies. As sous-chefs and servers become suspects, tensions rise in the kitchen. Was it a cooking rivalry gone too far, or does the secret ingredient lie in the chef's mysterious past?
11. "The Curse of the Crimson Ruby"
A cursed gem with a blood-soaked history disappears from a museum, only to resurface at an extravagant gala. The owner of the ruby is killed, and the gem vanishes again. Rumours of the curse spread like wildfire, and detectives must unravel the dark secrets behind the gem's curse, the gala guests, and the elusive thief.
12. "The Disappearing Detective"
A renowned detective known for solving the most complex cases vanishes without a trace while working on a high-profile murder investigation. His disappearance coincides with a cryptic letter left at the crime scene. The detective's protege and a sceptical journalist must team up to follow the trail of clues their mentor left behind and uncover the truth behind his vanishing act.
13. "The Suburban Secrets Society"
In a seemingly idyllic suburban neighbourhood, a series of seemingly unrelated murders occur. As the body count rises, it becomes evident that the victims were all members of a secretive neighbourhood club with dark, closely guarded secrets. With tensions rising and neighbors turning on each other, a detective must navigate the web of lies and betrayals to unveil the truth behind the suburban secrets society.
14. "The Whispering Woods Homicide"
In a secluded woodland retreat known for its tranquillity, a famous author is found dead in a cabin, surrounded by manuscripts filled with cryptic messages. The victim had been working on a controversial book that exposed the secrets of the town's most prominent citizens. As investigators delve into the reclusive community's hidden tensions and buried secrets, they must decipher the author's enigmatic notes to uncover the truth behind the murder.
15. "The Midnight Carnival Conundrum"
A traveling carnival that appears only at the stroke of midnight in a remote town becomes the eerie backdrop for a series of bizarre deaths. Each victim is found wearing an elaborate costume from the carnival, and their deaths are staged as macabre performances. With the carnival's elusive and enigmatic owner at the centre of the mystery, a detective must navigate the twisted funhouse of clues and illusions to unmask the killer before the next midnight arrives.
16. "The Phantom Photographer"
In the age of social media and selfie culture, a renowned photographer mysteriously vanishes after a high-profile photoshoot. Her camera, however, continues to upload unsettling images to her website, each one containing cryptic clues. As detectives and online sleuths attempt to decode the pictures, they unveil a dark world of secrets hidden behind the lens.
17. "The Quantum Conundrum"
In a cutting-edge laboratory, a brilliant physicist is found dead, seemingly killed by a paradoxical phenomenon related to her groundbreaking experiments in quantum physics. Her colleagues are baffled, unable to explain the bizarre circumstances surrounding her death. As investigators delve into the complexities of quantum mechanics, they must uncover the truth hidden within the blurred lines of reality itself.
18. "The Cryptic Case of the Lost Memory"
A man wakes up in a hospital room with no memory of who he is or how he got there. He soon discovers that he's the prime suspect in a murder case. With only fragments of memories and a sense of dread, he becomes both detective and suspect, piecing together his past to unravel the mystery of the murder and clear his name.
19. "The Puzzle Box Predicament"
A renowned puzzle designer is found dead in his locked study, surrounded by his most intricate creations. The only clue is a cryptic message hidden within a seemingly unsolvable puzzle box. As detectives struggle to crack the code, they uncover a network of puzzle enthusiasts with motives that are as enigmatic as the puzzles themselves.
20. "The Museum of Mysterious Artifacts"
A curator of an eccentric museum specializing in unusual and obscure artifacts is found dead among his exhibits. Each item holds a secret, and as investigators delve into the collection, they unearth a labyrinth of ancient rituals, forgotten legends, and hidden truths that may hold the key to solving the murder.
21. "The Cipher of the Secret Society"
A secret society steeped in arcane rituals and guarded knowledge is shaken when one of its members is found dead, bearing the marks of an ancient cipher. As investigators infiltrate the society's clandestine meetings, they encounter a web of allegiances, betrayals, and hidden agendas that lead to a shocking revelation.
22. "The Midnight Mosaic Murder"
A mosaic artist is discovered dead amidst a gallery of breathtaking artworks, each piece holding a fragment of a larger mystery. As detectives piece together the shattered clues, they uncover a tale of passion, betrayal, and an artistic rivalry that turned deadly.
23. "The Forgotten Vault"
In an old, forgotten bank vault, a box of unsolved cases is discovered, each containing the remains of cold, forgotten crimes. Among them is a mystery that has baffled detectives for decades. With fresh eyes and modern techniques, a new generation of investigators must crack the code and unearth the truth behind the forgotten vault.
24. "The Labyrinth of Lies"
A notorious maze designer is found dead at the centre of his most complex creation. The maze itself holds the key to his demise, concealing a trail of secrets and betrayals. As investigators navigate the twists and turns, they must confront the truth that lies at the heart of the labyrinth.
25. "The Riddle of the Time Capsule"
When a time capsule from a school's past is opened, it reveals a series of cryptic messages hinting at a long-forgotten crime. As former classmates reunite to solve the mystery, they uncover buried secrets and confront the shadows of their shared past.
26. "The Vanishing Act"
A renowned magician, known for his jaw-dropping illusions, disappears during a high-profile performance. His body is never found, and the mystery of his vanishing act becomes an enduring legend. Years later, a series of events hint at the truth behind his disappearance, leading a determined investigator to unravel the enigma of the vanished magician.
27. "The Forgotten Island"
A remote island, long forgotten by the world, holds the key to a centuries-old mystery. When a group of adventurers arrive to uncover its secrets, they find themselves entangled in a web of hidden treasures, ancient curses, and a murder that echoes through the ages.
28. "The Infernal Inheritance"
When a wealthy eccentric passes away, leaving behind an intricate series of puzzles and riddles, his heirs must work together to claim their inheritance. However, as they delve into the enigmatic challenges, they realize that the clues may lead to a dark family secret and a murder that has remained hidden for generations.
29. "The Haunted Hotel Heist"
In a once-glamorous but now abandoned hotel rumoured to be haunted, a notorious gang of thieves plans a daring heist. However, when one of the thieves is found dead under eerie circumstances, it's unclear whether supernatural forces or human treachery are at play. A detective must untangle the web of secrets that haunts both the hotel and its criminal occupants.
30. "The Cryptic Codes"
A retired cryptographer is found dead in his secluded cabin, surrounded by coded messages that have baffled even the best codebreakers. His final words hint at a long-buried conspiracy, but the meaning remains hidden. As investigators decode the cryptic messages, they unearth a conspiracy that threatens to rewrite history.
Remember, the key to crafting a killer murder mystery is to sprinkle in red herrings, create complex characters with motives aplenty, and keep your readers guessing until the final page. Whether you choose to weave a tale of time travel, haunted houses, or cunning criminals, these murder mystery story ideas are sure to spark your creativity and leave your readers on the edge of their seats. So, get writing and let your inner detective shine!
Happy sleuthing, and may your plots be as twisted as a pretzel on a rollercoaster!
Writing an elevator pitch is a great way to get to the core of your book. Grabbing the attention of a literary agent can be a daunting task, but if you can express the new and exciting concept that your book has to offer in just one short sentence, you’ll be off to a flying start.
In the lead-up to our Meet Your Match event on 14 February 2024, we asked leading literary agents why elevator pitches are so important and how you can make yours as compelling as possible…
Why bother?
A good elevator pitch doesn’t just show the agent that you understand your book’s unique selling point (USP) —it can also help you to think about your writing in a new way. Getting it right can take practice, but every time you put pen to paper, you’ll be narrowing down on what makes your book special just that little bit more.
“Elevator pitches are so important, primarily because they help YOU, the author, think about your book from a more salesy perspective—and throughout your book’s launch, you will need to be a constant salesperson for your story. Authors often have a hard time summing up their own book, but you’d be surprised by how much having a refined, concise elevator pitch will come in handy, and directly contribute to your book’s success!”
Think about the last time you picked up a book by a new author. What grabbed you about its premise? What made it feel fresh and interesting? An elevator pitch is a quick and easy way to get your agent, editor or reader hooked right from the beginning.
“A good elevator pitch bridges the gap between the familiar and the exciting. It tells me where your book sits on the market, and it tells me why your book isn’t like anything else on the market. So get that USP up front—tell me that you’re in a genre I love and tell me what you’re doing that nobody else in that genre has done before.”
One of the hardest parts of writing an elevator pitch is summarising your book in a single sentence. Practice makes perfect—but if you’re finding yourself unable to pick out that one crucial element at the core of your book, it could be a sign that something’s wrong.
“If you’re struggling with an elevator pitch because you have too much to say in just one line, it may be that your book is lacking a sharp hook—and that might be something worth revising.”
Looking for an example? Here’s one from our very own Katie Day – who, before joining the Jericho Writers team, was our 2022 Meet Your Match winner:
When the neighbour she’s been spying on suddenly leaves, a lonely woman inserts herself into the life of the girlfriend he left behind. SORROW & BLISS meets YOU in a commercial women's fiction with a dash of domestic suspense.
Why did we love it? Because it showed a great awareness of genre, it gave us enough information to catch our attention while leaving us with plenty of questions we wanted to see answered, and it did all of that in under 40 words. In short, it hooked us!
On 14 February 2024, we will be taking a look at your elevator pitches on Twitter/X with the return of our Meet Your Match event. Simply post your elevator pitch, details of your book’s genre and the hashtag #JWMeetYourMatch between 2pm and 4pm GMT, and we’ll match you with an agent we think would like to see your work. Plus, if we really love your pitch, you’ll also be in with a chance to win a free Agent One-to-One session!
Author (and Jericho Writers Premium Member) Liz Webb is back with THE SAVED, an utterly gripping thriller with a chilling premise set on an isolated Scottish island. If you haven't read our first interview with Liz charting her writing journey through to publication of her brilliant debut THE DAUGHTER, do catch up here.
Hello Liz, thank you so much for joining us again. The conversation did take some interesting turns! We spoke about what it’s like to write your first book versus your second, how supportive your publisher Allison and Busby is and the perils of googling ex-boyfriends.
Thanks so much for having me back. Well, my 2nd book was easier to write because of what I’d learned with the 1st one, but simultaneously harder, exactly because I knew more and had expectations to grapple with. But I’m very proud of both books. My publisher Allison & Busby continues to be marvellously supportive. And googling ex-boyfriends could turn out to be a great source for future plots: last interview I mentioned discovering that one ex was in prison for fraud and I recently found out that another is now a clairvoyant: oh that I could stop my heart for a couple of hours and visit him for a haunting!
And talking of stopping hearts, that’s the theme of my 2nd novel THE SAVED, published on Jan 25th 2024: Nancy discovers the body of her partner Calder floating in the freezing sea near an isolated Scottish island. Paramedics fail to resuscitate him but mysteriously say ‘you’re not dead till you’re warm and dead’. Because people can be brought back to life up to 6 hours later if they have a heart attack while extremely cold. Calder does indeed ‘come back from the dead’ and everyone says he’s fully recovered. But Nancy looks into his eyes and knows that something is very wrong. Now she’s going home with a stranger…
One thing that came through last time we spoke was your sense of humour. You’ve done many things, but as a former comedian (and a very funny person) what brought you to writing psychological thrillers?
If you hear a good joke, you’re laughing.
Read a tense thriller, you’re on edge and gripped.
Laughter and fear are both immediate visceral reactions. So trying to make someone laugh is not that dissimilar to making a book tense. In both, I’m trying to elicit a gut reaction. It’s just that a joke is short and you succeed or fail immediately; whereas a book takes aaages to write and the publishing process is glacial before you reach readers.
Secondly, both comedy and thrillers grab attention and take you out of yourself. I get bored easily, am super-lazy and can be tediously self-analytical. So I’m drawn to anything that shakes me out of my listlessness and navel-gazing and love comedy and thrillers. My most recent favourite comedy comes from the US comic Nate Bargatze, with his deceptively simple slants on everyday life. And my most recent favourite psychological thriller is Yellowface by R F Kuang: in which rabid publishing jealousy fuels theft, paranoia and payback; what’s not to like!
And thirdly, with both comedy and psychological thriller writing, I’m fulfilling my inexplicable compulsion to show off for praise. I’ve merely massively increased the buffer between the work and the reaction. I did stand up in my early 20’s when I was especially wild and needy, so I was on a roll enough to risk instant failure for the instant hit of laughs. In middle age, I’ve become more private and less desperate (ha!) and now I prefer to provoke more distanced reactions.
As well as being a former stand-up comedian, you’ve worked a variety of roles across the entertainment industry (including as a classical ballet dancer, voice-over artist, radio producer). Would you ever be tempted to set one of your books in the entertainment world?
My 1st book, THE DAUGHTER, featured an annoyingly confident actor as the brother of the narrator, even though the actors I’ve directed have been lovely people. Well, most of them.
In my 2nd book, THE SAVED, the protagonist Nancy is an ex-Radio Drama producer, like me. And I’ve made her as jaded as I felt when I stopped. She’s become an online film script editor and is working on a modern reimagining of Frankenstein. When I was a producer, people were always trying to sell ideas which were ‘re-imaginings’ of famous books. As my character Nancy says: ‘Yawn. Why does everything have to be re-imagined? … But hey, I’m getting paid shedloads to sleek up this tech-y confection, so, onwards.’ The Frankenstein theme of meddling with science to bring someone back from the dead runs through the book and one of my character’s motivations is inspired by this terrifying Frankenstein quote: ‘I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.’
For my 3rd book I’m toying with a voice-over artist character, a job I did for many years, for Persil, Kellogg’s and Herbal Essences, and it’s such an odd world of lies. I’d be standing at a microphone with my dirty greasy hair pulled back in a straggly knot, watching a glamorous model with thick flowing tresses on the screen, as I tried to sync my voice to her pouty lips: ‘I love how my hair feels, so strong, so silky, so alive’. That kind of angry dissociation could really drive a character to dark deeds…
Your second book The Saved is set on a spooky and isolated island off the west coast of Scotland. Was there a particular place or trip that inspired this location?
I knew I wanted to write about the unusual medical phenomenon that if you have a heart attack in freezing conditions, there is a slim chance of being brought back several hours later. So, I needed to set my book somewhere very cold, but wanted to stay in English speaking territory. Scotland in winter seemed appropriate and by chance I heard that a writer called Sarah Clayton (author of The Wrong Daughter) was running a writing retreat on one of the slate islands off the western coast of Scotland.
It was a great workshop and my book came alive on this stunning but stark slate island: the single storey white cottages with their un-unnervingly thick walls, the wild ever-changing weather, the atmospheric small single church, the bizarre whirlpools out at sea, the tightknit community, and the steep hills with sheep clinging precariously to the edge, from which they sometimes plummet to their deaths. I had fleshed out the whole plot by the time I left. I wrote it up and then returned for a second trip in the autumn to really experience the details: the odd woody Jenga block sound as you walk over the slates; the shockingly clear night skies with their piercing stars; and as I have a character lost at sea, I swam in the freezing waves in winter, which was so exhilarating and other-worldly. I knew that being alone and submerged in that icy water would change someone for ever.
In The Saved, your main character Nancy is living in a nightmare situation after a near-death experience transforms her partner Calder into a total stranger. When I heard that I instantly got chills and I need to know how it ends! Writers can often struggle to know whether an idea is strong enough to carry an entire novel. How did you come up with the concept and know it had the legs to become The Saved?
I saw a short film online about an incident in 2011 when seven teenagers were found floating in the ice-encrusted Præstø Fjord in Denmark after a school trip boat overturned in a storm. Their bodies were brought to shore two hours later. Everyone was shouting ‘they’re dead, they’re all dead’. But they were rushed to hospital, warmed up 1 degree per 10 minutes and, miraculously, their hearts started again at 26 degrees, six hours after they had stopped.
I instantly knew that this would be the start of my book. I’ve always been fascinated by the concept of ‘not being’ given that consciousness is so vivid. So the idea that you could be in a strange in-between place, dead, but with the potential to come back was catnip to me. I was interested in what it was like for the person who ‘died’ and for relations who fully believed that their loved one had died, but then they came back.
I felt that the idea of someone coming back from the dead and appearing changed was a great initial hook and this pulled the story along to the middle. From there, I used awful revelations about the accident to gradually unearth deeper secrets which led to the final terrible consequences.
You’ve mentioned how slate (the main substance the island in The Saved is made up of) is a particularly important motif in the book. Did this emerge naturally whilst you were working on the novel or did you always know you wanted to build your idea around this motif?
I had zero thought of slate initially. It was pure luck that the place I went to research cold seas off Scotland, happened to be a slate island. Once I saw the stunning beaches of Seil, Luing and Easdale, I knew my island had to be a slate one, because a slate beach is such a stunning sight. As Nancy says in my book: ‘It’s an awesome expanse of glinting angles, endless jagged grey shards, as if this huge gunmetal sea all around us had risen up into the air, frozen, and then exploded all over the shore.’ Slate mining stopped on the Scottish islands by the 1960s and moved to Wales but the old winches and water-filled pits left behind seemed to suggest buried secrets waiting to be brought back to the surface. I discovered that while slate is a hard-wearing substance used for roofs, once broken it can never be put back together again because pieces sheer off. This seemed like a perfect motif for a strong marriage pushed to extremes: if you start to think negative things about your partner, when do you reach the point of no return?
Last time we spoke you took us through your journey from writing your first draft, polishing it using Jericho Writer masterclasses during the Summer Writing Festival in 2020, through to publishing The Daughter in 2022 with Allison and Busby. Do you have any advice to writers hoping to follow in your footsteps?
Writing is a million times easier than so many jobs: eg. abattoir worker, sewage-spill-cleaner and anal-hair-bleacher (that is a real job). But writing is hard: to start, to traverse the middle, to finish, to edit, to entice an agent and to basically just stay sane in the hall of distorting fairground mirrors that is publishing.
My advice to would-be-writers is: be a writer if you actually like writing rather than just imagining being a writer; if you like writing most of the time then keep writing even when you don’t like writing; and when you really hate writing, go for a walk, have a toasted sandwich while watching CSI Las Vegas, get a good night’s sleep and then get back to writing. With plotting, push your initial idea beyond where it seems to rest at first, because I think readers of psychological thrillers want to be constantly surprised. And try to find a regular writing group of perceptive honest writer friends who will gently put bad ideas out of their misery while helping spark good new ones, commiserate with your hiccups and applaud your successes.
Any top tips on how they can make the most of writing resources?
I connect with Jericho whenever I need help. When I started work on book 3 a month ago, I was feeling pretty adrift ideas-wise, so I went on the Jericho website, put ‘ideas’ in the search box, and pressed enter. 198 videos and articles instantly flashed up. 198! I straightaway felt less loopy and seized-up. I watched several videos including: Generating Ideas with Rosie Fiore, New Ideas Hour with Sarah Ann Juckes, and How To Know If Your Story Idea Is Any Good With S J Watson. And as I watched, I started forming an idea which will hopefully become my 3rd book.
It’s so much easier to be creative when you’re reacting and interacting. And Jericho is the perfect place to spark your creativity, with its wonderful, ever-growing resources of videos, articles, blogs, masterclasses, courses, events, forums, groups and mentoring.
Thank you so much for joining us again. We really can’t wait to read The Saved when it comes out on the 25th of January. We have one final question before you go. Last time you mentioned that you don’t quite feel like an author yet, has this changed?
Ah ha, ha, haaa. ‘Feeling like a writer’ is very hard to hold onto. I feel like one when I’m in-the-flow of writing or for about ten seconds after I read a nice quote about my writing. But there are so many ups and downs in writing, that the feeling is pretty ephemeral. Hey ho. Since I’m getting into the flow of writing my next book and am seeing lots of nice quotes about my soon-to-be-published book THE SAVED, I guess I am ‘feeling like a writer’ at least some of the time.
Liz Webb
Liz Webb originally trained as a classical dancer, then worked as a secretary, stationery shop manager, art class model, cocktail waitress, stand-up comic, voice-over artist, script editor and radio drama producer, before becoming a novelist. She lives in North London.
Both her debut THE DAUGHTER and latest psychological thriller THE SAVED are available now.
When you finally type those glorious words ‘THE END’ at the conclusion of your novel, your thoughts will naturally turn to how you can get it in front of readers. Advice tends to focus on two established routes:
Self-publishing
Getting an agent who can then submit your work to large publishers
Both of these can be fine and noble routes to take, but both can also lead to disappointment. So I want to suggest that there is a third option that you can take: submitting directly to small presses.
The principal advantages of small presses over self-publishing are that they should have established systems and processes in place to get your book in front of readers, and they should also take all of the financial risk for you. This is great if you don’t have the time or skills to undertake all of the publication and marketing work yourself, and also if you don’t have the money you need to stump up upfront to meet self-pub costs (cover design, editing, proof-reading, printing, marketing etc).
The advantage of small presses over the agent route, is that small presses take submissions directly and so you avoid main pitfall of the ‘two-stage’ nature of the agent process: getting an agent only to find that they can’t place your book with a publisher – which happens a lot more often than many authors imagine.
You might think that these advantages would mean that small presses are overwhelmed with manuscripts, and the reputable well-established presses will certainly receive a lot. But most small presses will receive fewer submissions each week than a typical agent does. My publisher for instance, Lightning Books, receives around thirty to forty submissions per week and last year published four debut novels. In contrast, an agent might receive anywhere from fifty to 150 per week, from which she will typically take on somewhere between one and three new authors a year. And remember, even if you are accepted by an agent, that is no guarantee of publication: your agent will then have to submit to publishers. If you’re accepted by a small press, you’re accepted for publication. So, statistically, submissions to small presses are more likely to lead to publication than submissions to agents.
And it’s also worth remembering that, being small, there is typically a lot less administration and bureaucracy with small presses so the process from signing a publishing deal to seeing the book published is typically much shorter – usually a year (or even less) for a small press, as opposed to two years or more for a large publisher.
For many writers though, the dream of being published means getting a deal with a big advance and being on the shelves (or even the display tables) of every bookshop, and that requires a deal with big publisher – which in turn first requires an agent. The assumption is that being published is far more lucrative with a big publisher than with a small one, and that you can only get a deal with one of the Big Four if you first bag an agent. I want to suggest that both of these assumptions are misplaced.
Firstly, whatever you may have read about ‘six-figure advances’ in the past, even ‘Big Four’ publishers typically offer very small advances to debut novelists now, and sometimes won’t offer one at all. And, unless you are already well-known, your marketing budget is likely to be very low indeed even with a big publisher. You may well find your book being ‘held back’ in publicity campaigns behind bigger and more established authors too. So, whilst it is certainly the case that the potential for a higher profile and higher earnings are both increased with a bigger publisher, inreality there is often not a lot of difference.
It is also important to point out that going with a small press does not necessarily rule out securing a bigger deal with a bigger publisher at a later date. This is not uncommon and even has its own name: the ‘stepping-stone’ strategy. An author publishes a book through a small press, and it attracts some positive coverage (maybe even an award listing or two) which inevitably attracts the attention of agents and potentially even a large publisher. The upshot author’s next book is picked up by a larger publisher. The advantage of this approach is that when you arrive at the bigger publisher, you are more likely to be considered as one of the higher profile authors who others will need to take their place in the queue behind.
So it is important to say that, whilst many small press authors are happy to stay with a trusted team that they know and are comfortable with, others view their small press experience as simply another way of ultimately landing the prize they really want – a way that (unlike the agent route) means that they can get published while they’re waiting to land the big deal.
For many debut novelists therefore, submitting to relevant reputable small presses is more likely to help you achieve your ultimate dream of being published than following the agent route – and may even help you to land your dream agent and/or dream publishing deal in the long run.
So, how do you get published by a small press?
In September 2022 I was coming to the end of the Ultimate Novel Writing Course but, despite several full manuscript requests, had not managed to sign with an agent. I didn’t want to self-publish, so what could I do? Well, what I did was submit to about a dozen small presses. Small presses (sometimes called ‘indie presses’) are traditional publishers, but they take submissions directly from authors. In effect, submitting to them cuts out the need for an agent.
And it worked: I received two offers of publication and my novel, The Muse of Hope Falls, was published by Lightning Books in November 2023.
I must admit, I had preconceptions about small presses so my expectations of Lightning were pretty low, and there were certainly hitches and hiccups along the way. But I have to say that overall, the process went like a dream. Lightning have a small team, but they also have established systems, processes and contacts. And when something did go wrong, they apologised immediately and worked tirelessly to put it right. Whilst they don’t have the budget or profile of a Big Four publisher, they arranged reviews and press interviews for me, and even organised my launch party, so I never felt that they were giving my book anything less than 100%. Crucially, Lightning paid for everything so none of the risk sat with me.
For me, therefore, working with small presses is a viable third option for writers to consider. When thinking about submitting to a small press however, it is important that you don’t approach the process any less thoroughly than you would if you were approaching your dream agent. In broad terms this means following a process that is very similar to submitting to an agent, namely:
Get your manuscript ready
I mean really ready. I was fortunate to be on the Ultimate Novel Writing Course when I was submitting my novel, which meant that I got a professional manuscript assessment from my mentor Helen Francis, and I also benefitted from a couple of my course mates reading the full manuscript and offering feedback. It is essential that you have a similarly thorough approach. All the work that an agent would normally do on your behalf (and support you to do) before submitting to a publisher you’ll have to do yourself. Trust me: “It’ll do” won’t do, even – especially – with small presses.
Understand your manuscript and where it sits in the marketplace
You have to understand which publishers it is best to submit your manuscript to. That means understanding what type of story your novel is, who it is for, and where you would expect it to sit on the shelves of a bookshop. If you don’t understand that then you won’t know who to submit to.
Identify your target small presses
The Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook has a section listing most publishers and the genres they publish. You need to go through this with a fine-toothed comb and pick out those publishers that are open to direct submissions. Then you need to visit their website. Each small press will usually have a submissions page which will set out the kinds of books they are looking for including any specific requirements. If you can’t see books that look like yours on it, then that may be an indication that that publisher is not the right one for you.
A crucial part of the process is making a judgement about the publisher themselves. Small presses are notoriously fragile, so study the website and see how long the press has been going and how many books they’ve actually published (Lightning’s parent company have been going 27 years and publish 12-18 books every year). And don’t underestimate the difference in size and capacity between presses: some small presses will have relatively sizeable teams of paid staff. Others might really be run by hobbyists; someone trying to run a publishing company on their own in their spare time whilst still doing a paid job elsewhere. It’s not that there’s anything wrong with that, but you just need to understand what you’re signing up to and what they can realistically offer.
Also pay particular attention to anything that seems to suggest that you might have to pay for the privilege of being published by them and/or which suggests that they will publish your book ‘just the way you want it’ – this is vanity publishing. Reputable traditional publishers of any size will always be clear that they will expect to work with you editorially and that ultimately, they get the final say on things such as cover design/blurb etc.
Prepare bespoke submission packs
The publisher’s submissions page should also set out the format that any submissions should be made in. Do not send out a generic submission pack – always follow the advice on the submissions page, even if it means extra work for you. Sometimes those fiddly little bits of extra information or formatting that a small press asks for are there specifically to see if you’ve bothered to follow their instructions. If you haven’t, then you should expect to have your submission deleted straight away without being read.
One of the most crucial pieces of advice I can give is to consider carefully your use of comparison titles and, if possible, try and quote at least one example from the publisher’s own backlist. A small press is far more likely to consider you sympathetically if you can show that you have made the effort to study their books specifically (and maybe even read a couple of them) and that you understand how you would fit in with their existing list. Small presses want to be taken seriously and they want to produce a good product. It’s crucial therefore, that you don’t cut corners either with your manuscript preparation or your submission. If you get accepted my experience is that they can offer an excellent third way to publication for those authors who haven’t yet found their niche in the traditional ‘agent-to-big-publisher’ system.
My childhood world was painted with the enchantment of books, a gift I owe to my ever-inspiring mother.
The worlds and characters that came to life on the pages of my favourite fantasy novels (I particularly remember Terry Brooks’ The Sword of Shannara) transported me to places beyond my imagination.
I remember those winter evenings, under the warm covers of my bed when I passionately lived the adventures of elves, gnomes, and trolls in the woods and castles.
My passion for reading has never abandoned me, and inspired by these stories, as a boy, I had a burning desire to become a writer myself. However, I soon realized that creating compelling stories was no easy task.
So, I approached the study of dramaturgy, and it was only when I understood the concept of characters’ conflict that I truly understood what makes stories really work.
In this article, we will explore the different types of conflicts in a story, the role of conflict in driving storytelling, and how conflict enhances character development.
The role of conflict in driving storytelling
Conflict is the driving force behind a story.
Without conflict, we don’t have a story.
Conflict creates tension, raises stakes, and keeps readers engaged by presenting challenges the characters must overcome to change the condition of things.
Every story is the story of a change in the condition of things and of the evolution of characters during this process.
There are two main types of conflicts:
external conflict, which occurs when a character faces an obstacle or antagonist outside of themselves.
internal conflict, which takes place within a character’s mind and emotions. It involves the character’s struggles with their own desires, fears, or moral dilemmas.
Exploring the different types of external conflict
Let’s examine some examples of external conflict and their impact on storytelling.
Character vs. Character Conflict
This occurs when two or more characters have opposing goals or beliefs that directly clash with one another. The clash of personalities and motivations creates tension and drives the plot forward.
In Terry Brooks’ Shannara series, the protagonist must confront an antagonist who seeks to unleash dark forces upon the world. The conflict between these two characters fuels the narrative, as the protagonist must find a way to overcome their adversary and save the world from destruction.
Character vs. Society Conflict
This conflict occurs when a character’s desires or beliefs are at odds with the norms and expectations of the society in which they live. The character must navigate the challenges and obstacles presented by societal norms, often facing resistance and opposition.
In Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer”, Tom, a mischievous young boy, rebels against the rules and expectations of his small town. His desire for freedom and adventure clashes with the structured society he finds himself in, leading to numerous conflicts throughout the story.
Character vs. Nature Conflict
Character vs. nature conflict arises when a character must battle against the elements, natural disasters, or the harsh realities of the natural world. This form of conflict highlights the character's vulnerability and struggle to survive and overcome the forces of nature.
In Jack London’s “To Build a Fire”, the protagonist faces the brutal cold of the Alaskan wilderness. The struggle against the freezing temperatures and treacherous conditions becomes a central conflict, highlighting the fragility of human existence in the face of nature’s power.
Exploring the different types of internal conflict
Internal conflicts are as crucial as the external battles characters face. Let’s explore various types of internal conflicts.
Character vs. Self Conflict
This type of conflict occurs when a character is at odds with themselves. It may involve doubts, insecurities, or personal issues that challenge the character. This conflict often explores the deeper facets of the protagonist, leading to personal growth and self-discovery.
In F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby”, Jay Gatsby finds himself entwined in a ceaseless wrestle with his shadowy past, a consuming passion for Daisy Buchanan, and the elaborate façade he has meticulously crafted to assimilate into the upper echelons of high society.
Character’s Fear vs. Ambition Conflict
This conflict involves the contrast between a character’s fear or uncertainty and their ambition or goals. In the crucible of this inner turmoil, the character is compelled to confront the shadows of their own apprehensions while steadfastly pursuing their dreams and aspirations.
In J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series, Harry, faced with the omnipresent dread of the evil Lord Voldemort, must summon his unwavering courage and resilience, all the while relentlessly pursuing his noble ambition to defeat the dark wizard and safeguard the wizarding world.
Character’s Guilt vs. Redemption Conflict
This type of conflict delves into the character’s feelings of guilt and their quest for redemption through corrective or altruistic actions. The character’s conscience becomes a battleground, tormented by the weight of remorse yet driven by a desire to atone for their past actions.
In Charles Dickens’s “A Tale of Two Cities”, Sydney Carton is entwined with the theme of redemption. Consumed by the guilt stemming from his dissolute past, he is compelled to seek redemption through a singular, selfless act that will alter the course of his life and the lives of those around him.
Character’s Love vs. Ambition Conflict
This conflict revolves around the intricate interplay between personal love or relationships and the pursuit of ambition, success, or revenge. The character is trapped in the conflicting currents of their heart’s desires and overarching personal goals.
In Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights”, Heathcliff grapples with the relentless tempest within his soul, torn between the all-encompassing love he harbours for Catherine Earnshaw and an unquenchable thirst for vengeance against those who have inflicted deep wounds upon his spirit.
Character’s Self-Identity Crisis Conflict
In this type of conflict, the character grapples with an identity crisis, embroiled in a profound struggle to fathom their true essence. This internal turmoil is frequently marked by the presence of duality or intricate layers within the character’s identity.
In Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, Dr. Jekyll confronts an identity crisis that directly results from his transformation into Mr. Hyde. This metamorphosis plunges him into an inner conflict and serves as a thought-provoking examination of the dual nature within us all.
Character vs. Moral Conflict
Moral conflict is a compelling form of internal conflict that explores the clash between a character’s sense of right and wrong. This conflict arises when a character faces ethical dilemmas or must make difficult choices that challenge their values and beliefs.
In “Romeo and Juliet”, Shakespeare presents a character vs. moral conflict as the star-crossed lovers navigate their forbidden love. The conflict between their intense passion for one another and the feuding families they belong to creates a moral dilemma that drives the play's tragic events.
How conflict enhances character development
When characters face challenges and conflicts, they are forced to confront their fears, weaknesses, and flaws. This process of self-discovery and growth adds depth and complexity to the characters, making them more relatable and compelling to readers.
Conflict reveals a character’s true nature. In times of crisis, characters are pushed to their limits, and their actions and choices define who they really are. For example, a character who faces a moral dilemma may reveal their values and principles through their choices.
Furthermore, conflict allows characters to transform. As they navigate through challenges and overcome obstacles, characters evolve and change. They learn from their mistakes, acquire new skills, and develop resilience. This transformation adds depth to the characters and gives readers a sense of satisfaction and fulfilment.
Creating compelling conflicts in your writing
As a writer, to create compelling conflicts, consider the following techniques.
Establish clear goals and motivations. Each character should have clear goals and motivations that conflict with those of other characters. These conflicting goals create tension and drive the plot.
Raise the stakes. Make the consequences of failure high for your characters. The higher the stakes, the more invested your readers will be in the outcome of the conflict.
Create complex characters. Characters should have strengths, weaknesses, and flaws that can lead to conflicts. Develop well-rounded characters with conflicting traits to generate internal conflicts. To create complex characters, you can use writing software specifically designed for character development, such as bibisco, which allows you to get to know your characters thoroughly in a fun way — by interviewing them.
Introduce unexpected twists: Surprise your readers with unexpected turns of events that create new conflicts or escalate existing ones. This keeps the story unpredictable and exciting.
Allow for growth and change: Conflict should lead to character growth and transformation. Characters should learn from their conflicts and evolve throughout the story.
Techniques for resolving conflicts in a story
While conflict drives storytelling, resolving conflicts effectively to provide a satisfying conclusion is also important. Here are some techniques.
Character growth and change. Conflict should lead to character growth and change. Characters should learn from their conflicts and evolve throughout the story, meaningfully allowing them to resolve conflicts.
Compromise and negotiation. Characters can resolve conflicts through compromise and negotiation, finding common ground and working towards a mutually beneficial solution.
Redemption and forgiveness. Conflict resolution can also involve redemption and forgiveness. Characters may reconcile their differences and find forgiveness, leading to the resolution of conflicts.
External intervention. Sometimes, conflicts require external intervention, such as the involvement of a third party or the discovery of new information that changes the dynamics of the conflict.
Sacrifice and selflessness. In some cases, conflicts may be resolved through sacrifice and selflessness. Characters may put aside their desires and interests for the greater good, leading to the resolution of conflicts.
Conclusion
Conflict is crucial to keep readers engaged and invested in a story. It creates tension, suspense, and excitement, making readers eager to know how the conflict will be resolved.
Conflict also allows readers to connect with the characters on an emotional level as they witness their struggles, growth, and triumphs.
Moreover, conflict provides readers with a sense of catharsis. As they witness characters facing and overcoming challenges, readers experience various emotions, from fear and anxiety to relief and satisfaction.
This emotional journey adds depth and richness to the reading experience, making the story more memorable and impactful.
We were thrilled to chat to author Freya Berry about her second book, The Birdcage Library, and hear all about how she quit her job to write her first book and how she ended up meeting her agent at our Festival of Writing.
Thank you so much for catching up with us, in midst of what we expect is a very busy time for you.
I sort of been recovering since The Birdcage Library came out on the 22nd (June), and I've just been trying to lie down in a dark room. I always feel like publishing a book is slightly like a slow motion nervous breakdown, so it's nice to be sort of blinking in the daylight again. And yeah, getting back to my normal life and thinking about book three.
After your well-deserved rest, what is next on the horizon?
So I had to book contracts with The Dictator’s Wife and the and The Birdcage Library, I'm sort of coming out of that for the first time since my career started. I've got the idea for the third book, which I've been working out with my agent, and next it’ll be taking it to my editor and seeing what she thinks and all that absolutely not nerve wracking stuff.
Can you tell me a little bit about how your first book came about?
So I used to work in journalism and now I think I really love taking fact and making that into fiction. The Birdcage Library is based on real life people, real life animal dealers who lived in New York in the Gilded Age and the Dictator's Wife is very much based on real life dictator's wives and those kind of people. So, I was working in journalism and realized that wasn't for me. I preferred making stuff up (to a point).
So, I gave myself a year to write a book. I had been working in journalism for about four years and I spent a year and a half of that writing a first novel, which was terrible. I've never gotten back to it. But I think it was a good way to understand what the process involves, at least. I sent that novel out to a few agents not really knowing what I was doing and I got some feedback which was really helpful. It kind of made me understand that the book was never going to work. I kind of knew that, but it was helpful in encouraging me to try again.
So, I quit my job. I gave myself a year. I lived off savings and was able to live my parents’ house for a few months.
That’s amazing, such a brave move.
There was this one amazing agent who gave me pages of feedback, which was unbelievably kind of him. And so that did make me think that maybe this is something that I could do. I also spent a hell of a lot of time agonizing with myself. Should I quit my job to write? You can sort of reverse engineer it to make it sound like it was a plan, but it was a massive chance to give myself a definitive amount of time to do it. I’d saved up but it was definitely a leap of faith. It was a good thing I didn’t know what I was doing otherwise it would have been too scary!
So I took that year out, I just been reporting on the 2016 US election, which was obviously the one where Trump won for the first time, and it was Melania Trump, this sort of fake news concept and what is truth and so on, that became the roots of The Dictator's Wife.
I didn't know what I was going to write before I decided to quit, it just grew out of that experience. I wanted to set the Dictator's Wife in a fictional eastern European country where I had spent a bit of time in the past. I went back and I spent four months researching.
I turned up in Bucharest in February. There was snow on the ground, it was ten o’clock at night and my Airbnb host was late arriving and I thought what am I doing? As I was waiting in this dark stairwell for him to turn up, he arrived and said ‘I'm so sorry. I've just been to the protest.’ It turned out they were having the biggest protest they'd ever had since 1989 that night. So I went along with him and 300,000 people in the square chanting against the government and ended up in an underground bar in this abandoned palace.
It became a protest scene in the book and was a real instigating moment for that whole process. So, I was in Eastern Europe for four months, writing every day and talking to people and learning about the area and immersing myself.
After about four or five months, I had that first draft. I did another two or three drafts before I signed. I thought I've taken it as far as I could go. And that was around the time that I found the Festival of Writing. I came up to York and scoped out which agents I was interested in and one of my one-to-ones was with James Wills. Then he became my agent. So, York was really integral to that. It got a couple of other offers from agents at that festival too. It was a real turning point for me to be able to feel like this is a real thing.
Amazing. So, you met with James for your one-to-one, can you tell us how the other offers came about?
Yes, so I sent I sent James and a couple of the other agents who were interested the full manuscript. James had read the first chapter already and the others I pitched to while I was there.
That’s amazing. So, you pitched agents whilst you were at the Festival of Writing?
I think the good thing about being a journalist is you have to be utterly shameless in going up to people. So I think that was quite helpful. I think writing, as I've learned, is more about hustling than you think.
If you can go up to people, be nice and not aggressive, just to tell them in a few words whether it might be something they might be interested in, I think that's a really helpful skill to develop.
So, I went up to a couple of agents who liked the sound of it and they asked for the full manuscripts and I got a couple of offers off the back of that. But James seemed to really get the vision and we aligned.
I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for those conversations! How do you go up to an agent and pitch in person?
I perfected a little elevator pitch. What it is at the heart of this book and what makes it unique. The art of the sell is very different obviously to what you're writing. So, it's just kind of understanding what is important about your story and taking enough of a step back to understand the things that make people go, ‘ooh.’
It can be really hard to distil a 90,000 word novel into a sentence or two, removing things you have your heart set on.
I think agents do understand that they're not getting the full book in the sentence. For example, I think for The Dictator's Wife, my pitch was - dictator’s wife stands trial for her dead husband's crimes and weaves a web of secrets and lies around her young female defence lawyer - or something like that. And The Birdcage Library was: an adventuress discovers an old diary hidden in the walls of a Scottish castle which contains clues about this woman who vanished 50 years before, or something like that.
Can you tell us more about what happened after you signed with your agent?
Yeah, with, with my agent, we worked on the Dictator's Wife for a good year. There's no guarantees in this industry and so my work was very much focused on getting the manuscript to where it needs to be. And then James took the book and pitched it to editors.
What advice would you give to writers? It’s interesting to hear you wrote an entire book before The Dictator’s Wife.
I didn’t expect how much perseverance it takes to get a book published. You read the stories of people who say that they wrote a book on a whim, sent it off and got fifteen offers by the next morning. From the vast number of writers I've spoken to, that is not representative. I’m grateful that I didn’t know how long and arduous the process would be before I started.
It’s really important to be honest with yourself and make your book the best it can be. After I got an agent, I rewrote the entire book from third person to the first person. I remember it so well! I literally opened up a blank document next to the manuscript and just started.
You just can’t give up, that is the biggest differentiator. It might not be the first book or the second, but it’s just the people who don’t give up and are prepared to go through that mill who make it.
It is the only industry that I’ve ever encountered that talks about ‘positive rejections’ which tells you everything! It’s hard to put yourself out there. And then afterwards, it’s easy to say well done to you for coming through it. But at the time, no one is cheering you on, it’s only you and your self-belief, and hopefully your friends and family. It’s a big thing and I think anyone who is doing it is really brave and should feel loads of self-respect for themselves. No one will make you do it but that’s sort of the joy and the terror of it.
Freya Berry studied English Literature at Cambridge. She graduated with a double first and worked as a financial and political journalist at Reuters and the Daily Mail in London and New York. Her debut novel The Dictator's Wife was featured on the BBC's Between the Covers and was The New European's novel of the year. Her second, The Birdcage Library, is a story about an adventuress, part-based on her namesake Freya Stark. Freya lives in London.
We caught up with Hamish to chat all about his whirlwind journey to publication that involved an exciting three-book deal with Pan Macmillan and selling the film rights. But these things don’t happen overnight. To understand how Hamish go to where he is today, we have to go back to the beginning.
JW: Hi Hamish, congratulations on such an exciting book deal. Can you tell us a little about your path to publication?
In March of 2020, Boris Johnson announced the first lockdown of the UK to prevent the spread of the Covid19 virus and the business world that I was a part of shrugged its shoulders and carried on. At the time, I was working in the retail sector and shops remained open so Head Office and other functions found ways for the long working days to continue via endless Zoom calls.
By the end of the year, the seriousness of the pandemic had become apparent and the restrictions had become more stringent and so for the first time in thirty years, I found myself at home without a full schedule of meetings and an angry inbox brimming with unread messages.
This was quite refreshing for a couple of days and then as the novelty wore off, I found myself wandering around the house looking for things to do. The inbox was clear, the impossible to-do list had vanished and an idea that had been lurking in the back of my mind since my school days began to take shape.
It was Boxing Day 2020 and I came to breakfast refreshed and alive with energy. “I am going to write a book!” I announced victoriously (I may have used the word bestselling in this sentence). My wife and children laughed. It was the first of many reality checks that would happen over the next three years in navigating the very unique and often frustrating world of publishing a novel.
So, at aged 48, equipped with my ‘B’ in A-Level English and a huge pile of books that I had read over the years, my plan was set; I would dash off a beautiful manuscript, sent it off to a big publisher and wait for the seven-figure advance cheque to arrive in the post. My only dilemma was whether to have Bollywood star Deepika Padukone in the lead role for the film or let the big guns from LA fight it out for Hollywood. This was the start of my historical series The Harveen Gill Mysteries.
My solution to this impossible problem was simple. Cheat.
As the story began to take shape, I started looking into the process of getting my book published and realised that major book companies would not accept an unsolicited manuscript. It would have to be submitted by a reputable agent and it appeared that getting such an agent would be a task in itself.
The best agents seemed to be getting hundreds of queries a week and response times went from non-existent to many, many months. Some analysis of deals announced over the last two years would suggest that authors with a South Asian background account for a little over 2% of all deals and historical fiction as a category accounts for around 3% of deals. I would be shooting at a pretty small target.
My solution to this impossible problem was simple. Cheat.
I looked for a writing community that would help to fill in all gaps in my knowledge and skill set. Joining Jericho Writers was an important step in this process. It allowed me to access comprehensive information on editing, refining my query and getting an agent without having to take the scary step of actually talking to someone (we writers can be a pretty reclusive group).
I used the Jericho Writers agent 1-2-1 service to better understand what agents were looking for, and then used my own network to find people who were in the book industry. I found that by being brave and telling people about my journey and asking for help, a number of introductions happened that led to both the agents that I worked with including the lovely Jane Compton who secured my deal.
Initially, The Muziris Empire, at 130k words, received detailed and mostly enthusiastic responses, editors taking time to explain why they were passing, but passing nonetheless. Entering competitions, working with a couple of beta readers and then finding an editor, the wonderful Holly Domney, who transformed the manuscript into a tight, all-action, historical adventure at just under 100k words.
The second round of submissions to publishers went much wider, to major publishers from both India and the USA as well as the UK. We had strong interest from the start resulting in a number of interested parties and a pre-empt from Pan Macmillan India into what had become a three-book series.
Looking back, there are so many things that I didn’t know at the start of the process and kind people that helped me along the way, so I am always keen to help other along their journey, especially those from traditionally underrepresented parts of the writing community.
JW: Is there anything you wish you knew before becoming a published author?
Looking back, there are so many things that I didn’t know at the start of the process that I wish I had. If you’re a writer, my advice is to:
Get out to live events. The writing community is generally open and supportive, I found that meeting people really helped me on my journey.
Join a writing community, ideally that has members that write in your chosen genre as they all have nuances. Historical fiction writers talk about the joys of deep research, staying true to history, best publishers for the category and other things that may not be relevant for YA writers for example.
Enter competitions, especially those that give feedback. Writers often complain about the lack of agent comments on rejections. For many reasons this type of feedback can be misleading. Better sources of constructive advice can come from competitions, betas and writing groups.
Get busy on socials: follow writers, agents, publishers. Do interact with their posts. Do not slide into their DM’s asking for help with your project straight away! It’s a great source of information and upcoming events.
Refine and edit your manuscript. I have recently blogged about the query trenches and why writers may get into a loop of sending out the same query over and over. It took me many versions of both manuscript and query letter to get it right. Eventually I worked with the amazing Holly Domney on a developmental edit which really opened my eyes to some ways to improve the book.
Submit to agents/publishers outside of the UK. AgentMatch is a great resource to find potential agents, looking at the latest #MSWL on X also put me in touch with some great people. My deal was sold outside the UK. Read, read and read. There is so much to learn from what is being published.
Find your own routine and be kind to yourself. Lots of authors advocate for writing so many words a day and at set times. Everyone has a unique life situation and to be the most productive and creative, I think your writing needs to fit in with that. Don’t beat yourself up using someone else’s yardstick!
Keep going, it can be a long process but, I believe in you.
Many kind people helped me along the way, so I am always keen to help others along their journey, especially those from traditionally underrepresented parts of the writing community.
About Hamish
Hamish Morjaria was born and brought up in North London. Having spent three decades in the business world, working for leading brands and retailers, he finally indulged his passion for ancient history and fast-paced thrillers to create The Harveen Gill Mysteries. When not writing, Hamish can be found watching cricket or walking his dog Simba during the day, and sitting in front of the fire with a cup of tea and a good book in the evening.
Hamish lives with his wife Kalpa, two children and dog in Buckinghamshire.
An edge-of-the-seat trilogy rooted in ancient Indian history that blends conspiracy theories and ancient secrets as ambitious Indian archaeologist Dr Harveen Gill races against time to make the discovery of a lifetime. But there are greater powers at play, watching her every move. As she pursues the fame and glory she craves, how much is Harveen ready to risk?
The Muziris Empire is the first book in the series and is slated for a summer 2024 publication. The Da Vinci Code meets The Magicians of Mazda in this enthralling alchemy of mythology, science, religion and cryptography, told across three interweaving perspectives, moving back and forth in time and set in present-day Kerala, which was once home to the ancient city of Muziris.
We caught up with Nitin Lakhani, Simply Self-Publish course alum and Jericho Writers member to celebrate the release of his debut novel Lalji's Nairobi and hear about his journey to publication.
JW: Can you tell us a little bit about the process your book went through from writing the first draft, through to publication?
I came to writing quite late after retiring from medical practice in the NHS. My first novel, ‘Lalji’s Nairobi’ had a long incubation period as I wanted to write it from when I was a teenager, the story being loosely based on my grandfather’s life story.
It is a story of four young men who leave Gujarat as economic migrants to escape famines and high taxes under the British Raj. Led by Lalji they travel across the ocean and arrive in British East Africa where their skills are required but the politics is against them. Lalji, their leader, chose to put roots down inland in Nairobi which at that time was a small market town. Through sheer determination and strong business abilities, Lalji achieves success against difficult odds. It is a ‘rags to riches’ tale with unexpected danger that puts Lalji’s success at risk when he is at his most vulnerable.
JW: Can you tell us a little bit about the process your book went through from writing the first draft, through to publication?
Although I started with a story ‘in me’ it is fair to say I had little confidence or knowledge of how to go about publishing it. I was certain I wanted to self-publish as I saw many advantages there compared to the traditional route, especially as I knew my novel was going to be different from other historical novels.
My initial research led me to join Jericho Writers on a monthly subscription to see what I made of the writing world. I was inspired by one of Harry’s blogs where he encouraged budding authors to start writing and worry less about issues like genre. His stance was to get writing and doing it well. Then edit the book to near perfection before pitching or self-publishing.
Before I started putting any words down I spent umpteen hours researching. That was an essential step to ensure accuracy, especially for a historical novel.
By the time I had finished my manuscript - accelerated by the pandemic lockdown - I was ready to have it read by an author. Here, Jericho Writers helped identify an experienced manuscript reader. The next step was to immerse myself in polishing the plot, cleaning up the text and cycles of self-editing. All this required my personal input before engaging a copy editor.
So far so good. However, the area that was most challenging, of which I had little knowledge, was the world of self-publishing. I read and listened to self-published authors and I was convinced it was the right way for my novel. But there was a steep learning curve, especially if one wanted to do it properly and do it well.
That’s when I decided to do the Jericho Writers Simply Self-Publish course. The course over ten weeks covered the full breadth of how to get self-published. Debbie Young runs the carefully crafted course with talks, discussions and homework which are available for future reference. There is a lot to learn to self-publish successfully and Debbie’s excellent course set me firmly on the right path. Her feedback and encouragement on a personal level were particularly helpful for me.
JW: Sounds like it was a lengthy process, did you lose heart at any stage?
The process could have been shorter if I had been more engaged, and perhaps more disciplined. But I also found going away from writing for spells helped me regain my creative drive. Similarly, I did not mind starting the self-publishing course after the final draft was complete.
And no, I did not lose heart! Writing is so engaging. Knowing you are producing something original which hopefully others will enjoy spurs you on.
JW: You were developing your craft for several years before you were published, is there anything you found particularly useful on your journey?
Two things come to mind immediately. Firstly, research, which was great fun. I could lose myself for hours on a subject. It was all quite relevant to get a feel for the period even if I did not use individual pieces.
Secondly, the talks and material on the Jericho Writers site. The wealth of material on the site is fantastic. For a budding author, the content by experienced authors, agents and publishers in one place is a great boon.
JW: What advice would you give to writers working on their first draft?
I am not sure I am qualified to give advice! But seriously, the advice I received and which helped me most was what I gained from the talks and reading on the JW site.
Secondly, your writing environment is also unique like your book. How, when and where you write must feel right for you. Get all the externals right so that you can be in an undistracted and comfortable place with your writing. Changing the environment is allowed but always make sure everything feels right and distractions are avoided.
JW: You mentioned you first thought about writing what would become ‘Lalji’s Nairobi’ when you were a teenager. After having spent years working on the story, spending infinite amounts of time with your protagonist, and waking up sporadically in the middle of the night with edit ideas – how did you know it was time to publish?
Isn’t it strange about the middle of the night gems? After re-editing multiple times, you realise further editing reduces the returns, and it is time for a copy edit. That break from self-editing I found therapeutic. In my case, it prepared me to be able to look at the copy-edited version with fresher eyes. Then it was a case of engaging a cover and internal designer which was the fun part.
JW:Can you let us know what are you working on now?
Firstly, a long trip to North America which I had promised my wife before Covid. Her patience, support and encouragement kept me going.
I would like to see how ‘Lalji’s Nairobi’ is received before deciding on my next venture. Writing is a lonely occupation and feedback is important for all of us. I expect that will help crystallise what comes next.
About Nitin
Nitin is a historical novelist who came to writing his debut novel after retiring as a doctor. Born in Kenya before its independence he came to England at the age of fifteen. His parentage is Indian, his grandfather having moved during the British Raj from Gujarat in India to Colonial East Africa as an economic migrant.
His debut novel, Lalji's Nairobi, was released in the summer of 2023 and is available from Amazon Books and Waterstones.
Tropes can be easily overdone, but when applied with care, they can enhance your writing and engage your readers.
In this article, I'll discuss the definition of the term trope, describe the most predominant tropes in sci-fi, and explain how you can utilise tropes in your science fiction novel.
What Is A Trope?
A trope is a common, recognisable plot feature, theme, and/or premise that recurs throughout a certain genre or subgenre.
Science fiction as a genre is over 200 years old, so there are many sci-fi tropes to choose from.
Tropes are sometimes considered cliché, but if you use them effectively (or add in a twist to keep your readers on their toes) they can help develop and strengthen your story.
Top Sci-Fi Tropes
Here are 25 of the most common, and interesting, science fiction tropes.
Time Sci-Fi Tropes
Time is a key theme and concept in science fiction, as characters often travel backwards and forwards in time, lose their sense of time, and try not to alter various timelines.
Alternate History
This trope has been used with increasing frequency in recent years. An alternate history can involve one specific adjustment to past events (such as if women had been granted the right to vote 20 years earlier) or a myriad of them which all add up to create a society that's recognisable, though distinctly different from our own.
Using an alternate history can enable you to add lots of different themes to your work, explore the ramifications of making one or several adjustments, and highlight the fact that every action and event affects the ones that follow it.
Parallel Universe
This is different from an alternate history, as parallel worlds involve different universes and events that are often happening concurrently, and sometimes feature various versions of each individual. Your characters may even be able to travel between these universes.
Whereas, with alternative universes/alternate histories, some of the specifics of a universe have been changed, but the rest is the same, and these two universes are separate entities that do not co-exist.
Time Paradox
A time paradox is a classic for a reason. If your characters are travelling through time, any actions they take may alter the past and have unforeseen consequences in the future. This trope has to be intricately woven into the story, as every minute action your characters make will have a cumulative effect, and readers will enjoy looking back at all the clues indicating that things are going wrong.
A Time Loop
The trope in which the main characters in a story get stuck in a time loop has become increasingly popular over the past few years and has featured in quite a few recent science fiction films. This often revolves around characters repeating the same day over and over until they've resolved any unfinished business they had, changed their ways, or dealt with a serious life-threatening obstacle.
Many of them feature some kind of time machine or portal that is the key to the characters returning to their daily lives once they've resolved the issue that's forced them into time purgatory. It can be easy for these stories to feel a little repetitive, so try to ensure that you're still moving the story forward and adding interesting elements to keep your readers engaged.
Science And Technology Sci-Fi Tropes
Sci-fi classics, like Star Trek, often explore our relationship with science and technology, as new discoveries alter our perception of reality.
Mad Scientist
The mad scientist trope is a much beloved one and is frequently used in sci fi. While the outdated term 'mad' is inaccurate and cruel, the meaning behind the phrase is still valid. This trope generally refers to scientists with ideas that far exceed others' understandings, causing them to be teased until the inevitable revelation that they were right all along. Though they often struggle to come to terms with the unforeseen consequences of their discoveries.
This trope goes hand in hand with all sorts of hijinks, miscommunications, foreshadowing, and character development, so it's one that you can really have fun with.
Genetic Modification
Genetic modification is the kind of trope that you can hang your entire plot upon, or use to enrich your world-building. This trope may involve the creation of new creatures, parents having the capacity to alter their childrens' genes before birth, or a world in which your status is determined by how 'perfect' your genes are (as only the wealthy can afford to alter them). There's certainly a lot to explore with this trope.
Artificial Intelligence
Untrustworthy artificial intelligence is a trope that was once scary in a hypothetical sense but is now eerily edging closer to our own reality. This can involve robots that no longer follow commands, AI that is trying to replace and eliminate humans, or robots/machines that are becoming sentient and are being held captive by humans.
This evokes lots of themes about philosophy, morality, free will, consciousness, and what it means to be human. It also explores the rapid growth of technology, and how it can have both profoundly wonderful and irreversibly detrimental effects.
Cloning
Cloning is another trope which brings up issues of ethics, morality, and philosophy. There are lots of options in terms of who is doing the cloning (scientists, aliens, robots etc.) and who is being cloned.
Nuance is important here, as if one of your characters is suddenly extremely apathetic when they're usually incredibly enthusiastic, your readers will catch on quickly, and they won't have the chance to slowly unravel the puzzle you've created.
Think about how you can use clones in an unusual way. Perhaps the clone only goes out at night, so it takes a while for them to be spotted. Or maybe they lurk in your protagonist's home while they're out at work.
Teleportation
Teleportation as a regular mode of travel is one sci-fi trope that many of us wouldn't mind making into a reality. Though, of course, there would be implications to teleporting everywhere.
Perhaps humans' legs are growing weaker as a result, or the government is charging a high toll fee for people who teleport to places outside a 20-mile radius. You could also think of interesting ways in which your characters can teleport. Do they flash neon purple for a second as they teleport? Or perhaps they freeze for half a second before they disappear.
Creating Monsters
This harks back to the classic horror/science fiction of Frankenstein, wherein a scientific breakthrough goes awry, and a scientist unintentionally wreaks havoc on themselves and the world. Fun.
You could tie this into AI, medical advancements, or new technologies, and play around with your monsters' horrifying abilities and skills.
Government Surveillance
This is another sci-fi trope that's becoming uncomfortably close to our reality. You could make this something that a few people know about, or implement it so that it's a part of daily life in the world you've created.
You could have the government employ one or two surveillance tactics, like facial recognition being installed on all public cameras; or you could decide that the government tracks people's locations, finances, healthcare data, internet usage, and every other conceivable thing.
Using this trope, and writing about it, may end up terrifying you as much as it will your future readers.
Organ Harvesters
Lots of sci-fi and speculative fiction stories depict fictional worlds in which human resources are running low, and so those higher up in the hierarchical structure receive more access to them. In darker sci-fi tales, this can involve organ harvesters who track people down to steal their organs. This often occurs in post-apocalyptic narratives which take place in already dire circumstances.
Everything Is A Simulation
This particular trope can easily veer into being cliche, especially if it's used as a plot twist right at the end of the story. If you're working up to the revelation that the events of your story are all part of a simulation, try to include lots of hints leading up to it, and make sure that it's an interesting addition to the story, rather than something that the whole framework of your book hinges upon. Ideally, your book should still make sense even without this revelation.
Alternatively, you could have some of your characters aware that they exist in a simulation (think The Matrix) while others are totally unaware, which would enable you to really utilise dramatic irony.
Space Sci-Fi Tropes
With the popularity of space operas such as Star Wars, space-related topics and tropes are generally predominant in science fiction.
Space Pirates
Space pirates are the ideal characters to turn to if you want your characters' trip to space to come with a little chaos. Like their seafaring compatriots, space pirates steal and capture other vehicles (in this case, spacecrafts) and they may kidnap, enslave, or even kill the passengers and crewmembers on the spacecrafts they take over.
Wormholes
Wormholes are another satisfying science fiction trope, though try not to rely on them too heavily. Wormholes are portals that allow you to travel to different dimensions, and they can be an interesting addition to your story both in allowing your characters to make progress on their journeys and in acting as an obstacle if they suddenly stop working, disappear, or if only some characters know how to navigate them.
They can be the tool used by your antagonist to help them ensure they're always one step ahead of your main characters. Or perhaps they explain why one of the characters suddenly has access to technology and rare plants that the other characters have never even heard of. Not only can you toy around with the types of dimensions your characters enter, but also what the wormholes themselves look like. Are they disguised as billboards? Or perhaps every broken swing in a public park is a well-hidden portal.
Lost In Space
Another frequently used sci-fi trope (often utilised in sci-fi movies too), is the notion of being lost in space. This can refer to an entire spacecraft, an astronaut that's accidentally left behind, or any other scenario you can concoct. The focus here is usually on survival, the desire to return home (if, in your story, Earth is still there/at all hospitable), and navigating any extraterrestrial conflicts.
Alien Sci-Fi Tropes
Space and aliens often go hand in hand, and in your story, you get to decide whether aliens are technologically advanced allies or the species set upon destroying humanity.
Aliens Crash Landing
The alien crash landing is perhaps the most ubiquitous of all sci-fi tropes. This startling event is often witnessed by a child, elderly person, or someone with a very active imagination, as it is generally believed to be a falsehood until people are met with the irrefutable truth. You could twist this by having a parent trying to convince their child of this unexpected occurrence, or having someone who's very logical and trustworthy witness it. This trope often goes hand in hand with a mysterious overnight abduction.
Alien Invasion
The classic conflict of humans vs. aliens is at the heart of many hard science fiction stories. You could write about a world in which aliens have already completely invaded Earth, and humans are forming underground groups as they plan to fight back. Or you could start your book right as the alien invasion begins, and have some territories remain under human control. With this trope, there's often a discrepancy between the more advanced technology and resources aliens have and what humans possess in comparison, so lots of other tropes weave into this one nicely.
An Alien Signal From Space
Having your characters hear an alien signal from space is a great way to start a story. Especially if it's the first contact humans have made with aliens.
This trope is particularly effective with soft science fiction, as you can explore the aliens' capabilities, and build up to a potential meeting, adding in elements of space travel and the potential limits of our own technology as you go.
General Sci-Fi Tropes
There are so many different subgenres and themes in the sci-fi realm, and these tropes can help you explore a different side of your story.
Survivalism
Survivalism is a trope that was once exceedingly popular but is now a little less common. This trope refers to characters being stranded somewhere (perhaps on a foreign planet) or existing in a post-apocalyptic universe where survival is their biggest obstacle. Searching for sustenance, finding shelter and a place to rest, and determining whether or not there are any nearby predators are just a few of the things they'll prioritise as they navigate unfamiliar terrain. Resilience, adaptability, and the power of hope are all themes which this trope draws from.
Utopia
Utopias are science fiction tropes that aren't utilised as much as the others. Idealised utopian worlds are often universes where things like racism, homophobia, sexism, and capitalism have been eradicated. The conflict here could arise from the early stages of development, where these enhancements are being gradually integrated into society. Or, as is most popular, the main issue could be that life in this world isn't quite as perfect as it seems.
Dystopia
The utopia's opposite and adversary, dystopian worlds are such popular sci-fi tropes that they've become a subgenre in their own right. In this world, everything that could go wrong has gone wrong, and life is extremely bleak.
To some, this reassures people that things could always be worse. For others, it's just a reminder of how terrible life can be. If you're in the latter camp, and your book's heading in a dystopian direction, might I suggest that you have a list of your favourite songs/things/TV shows etc. to hand so that you aren't constantly in a sombre mindset during the writing process.
Immortality
The theme of immortality is present throughout many sci-fi stories, as science fiction authors explore their interpretations of an immortal being. It may be that your book features evil aliens who are unfortunately immortal, immortality is achieved by implanting human brains into robot forms, or, in relation to the genetic modification trope, scientists are manipulating genes in an attempt to create infallible immortal beings.
A Human Gains Superpowers
A much-beloved trope, a human gaining superpowers after being exposed to an alien substance, radiation, or some other species or powerful force, serves as a great inciting incident for your story.
People love an underdog, and with this trope, there's plenty of room for character development, and you can explore the everyday version of your protagonist as well as their superhero alter ego.
Plus, you can experiment with the kinds of abilities your character has at their disposal, from super speed to psychic powers, and from the ability to heal people to superhuman strength.
Post-Apocalyptic Worlds
Multiple science fiction/dystopian films, TV shows, books, video/virtual reality games and other storytelling formats feature post-apocalyptic worlds. These often take place in the near future, after an environmental collapse, nuclear war, the effects of climate change, a mutant virus/bacteria, alien invasion, or the infiltration of various artificial intelligences etc. Post-apocalyptic worlds are also likely to feature desolate landscapes, totalitarian governments/leadership, government surveillance, and some kind of developing uprising/resistance.
How To Use Sci-Fi Tropes In Your Writing
So, now you know some of the most interesting and commonly used science fiction tropes, it's time to think about how you can apply them to your own writing.
Don't overload your book with tropes- focus on just a few tropes that will genuinely add to your story and engage your readers
Don't feel you have to use any tropes at all- tropes are useful devices, but only include them if it makes sense to do so; if you add them in because you think you have to it'll seem forced
Think about how your chosen trope is typically used, and see if you can find a way to subvert the norm
Combine genres- you could use a trope from a common subgenre of sci-fi (like dystopian fiction) and blend it with another genre; perhaps your protagonist ends up in a parallel world wherein their sister is a powerful sorcerer
Create Your Alternate Universe
Tropes aren't inherently good or bad, it's all about how you use them. Experiment with different tropes, see what works best for your story and characters, and focus on the execution.
It may be that researching different tropes prompts you to look into related topics that intrigue you, and soon you'll be adding a whole host of other planets, wormholes, or aliens to your work in progress.
JW: We’re so pleased to hear your debut A Mother’s War was published with Boldwood Books recently. Can you tell us a little about yourself and your writing journey that led you up to this point?
I come from London but have been living in Hamburg, Germany for over 25 years. Like so many of us, I always wanted to write a book, but there never seemed an appropriate time in daily life.
In order to avoid empty nest syndrome when my daughter left home to study, I decided that was the moment to start my writing journey. But how? I had no formal writing qualifications, had never had anything published and had no idea what skills were required to actually write a novel.
Stumbling around the internet I came across Jericho Writers and that changed everything. Working my way through every teaching video available, I studied the craft of writing and learnt about the fascinating world of publishing. I completed a novel and using the Jericho Writers AgentMatch service, I started the tortuous process of submission.
I didn’t receive a full manuscript request but one particular encouraging response from an agent at Curtis Brown inspired me to keep going. When lockdown arrived I joined a Curtis Brown Creative online writing course. By this time I had a new idea for a book, and the manuscript I worked on with Curtis Brown became A Mother’s War which was published in May.
JW: Can you tell us a little bit about the process your book went through from writing the first draft, through to publication?
I sent out my manuscript on submission, again using AgentMatch. This time, I received a full request. The agent felt it wasn’t quite ready and kindly gave me detailed feedback. She also invited me to resubmit. Not wanting to mess up this amazing opportunity, I decided I needed a professional manuscript assessment and turned to Jericho Writers. I read the profiles of their editors and came across Clare Coombes of the Liverpool Literary Agency. Amongst the things that attracted me to Clare was her love of WW2, historical fiction which was the genre of my novel.
Clare did a detailed, brilliant assessment which shone with knowledge and passion for the genre. She also loved my book! After a couple of video calls and numerous emails, she offered me representation; an unbelievable and wonderful moment. After that, things moved very fast. We edited for about six weeks and Clare submitted to about 12 publishers. Within three months I had a publishing deal!
JW: You were developing your craft for several years before you were published, is there anything you found particularly useful on your journey?
Definitely being part of a writing community such as Jericho Writers. The support, feedback and friendships are invaluable. Also a shout out for Debi Alper’s incredible Self-Edit Your Novel Course, and of course for Clare’s astute manuscript assessment.
JW: Were there any surprises along the way? Or perhaps anything you wished you had known earlier, or been prepared for?
I was stunned how many times a book is edited before it goes to print! I also didn’t realise I would be working on three books at once: marketing the one out now, finishing book two, and starting book three. It is all very intense, but I love it and am very grateful to have this opportunity.
JW: What advice would you give to writers working on their first draft?
Every writer has to find a way that works for them. Some throw out a messy first draft and just get the words down, others like me edit as they go. But what I would suggest is getting feedback and another perspective on your work, either through the Jericho Writers community or an online writing group. No one needs to write in isolation.
JW: We understand A Mother’s War is part of an exciting three-book deal with Boldwood Books. Can you let us know what are you working on now?
I have just submitted book two to my editor which is another WW2 story, this one set at the time of Austria’s annexation with Germany. Like my first book, it contains themes of romance, resistance and impossible choices.
About Helen
Helen is from London and now lives in Hamburg Germany with her husband, daughter and rescue dog.
After giving English lessons to retired Germans for twenty years, she became intrigued by many of their wartime stories which has inspired her writing. Helen’s childhood summer holidays were spent with family in Austria and she draws on her experiences for her second book.
Her debut novel, A Mother's War, was released in the summer of 2023.
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